


^^. 



f^ 



^*^. ■ 





■^y if- 



^-^^ 






= (Tv- 



























V o ' * °' ex 






C 



0' 







-^ 




TWENTY-FIVE YEARS IN THE 
BLACK BELT 




William J. Edwards 



Twenty-Five Years 
in the Black Belt 



BY 



WILLIAM J. EDWARDS 




ILLUSTRATED 



THE CORNHILL COMPANY 

BOSTON 



ETiSS' 



Copyright, 1918 

by 

The Cornhill Company 



n 



^s' 



9 0T 



MAR 2P 1^19 



vS)CI.A5I277 



A 



TO MY LOVING WIFE WHO ENCOURAGED ME IN ALL MY 

EABLY STRUGGLES AND AIDED ME IN 

ALL MY ACHIEVEMENTS 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTEK PAGE 

1. Childhood Days 1 

2. Shadows '^ 

3. A Ray of Light 13 

4. Life at Tuskegee 18 

5. Reconnoitering 26 

6. Founding the Snow Hill School .... 35 

7. Small Beginnings 37 

8. Campaigning for Funds in the North . . 43 

9. Results '*9 

10. Origin of the Jeanes Fund 54 

11. Appreciation 56 

12. Graduates and Ex-Students 63 

13. The Solution of the Negro Problem . . 77 

14. The Greatest Menace of the South . . 86 

15. The Negro Exodus 94 

16. The Negro and the Public Schools of the 

South 100 

17. Where Lies the Negro's Opportunity ? . 104 

18. School Problems of a Tuskegee Graduate 109 

19. Benefits Wrought by Hardships . . . 115 

20. The Negro and the World War . . . . 210 
Appendix 127" 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



/ 



Frontispiece 

32^ 



William J. Edwards 

Uncle Charles Lee and His Home in the 

Black Belt Facing Page 

First Trustees of Snow Hill and Two / 

OF Their Wives " " 36 "^ 

Partial View of Snow Hill Institute " " 48/ 

A New Type of Home in the Black Belt " " 52 

Typical Log Cabin in the Black Belt " " 60 

Home of a Snow Hill Graduate ... " " 60 

Graduates of Snow Hill Institute . . «« «« 72 . 

Teachers of Snow Hill Institute . . « " joo / 



PREFACE 

In bringing tMs book before the public, it is my hope 
that the friends of the Snow Hill School and all who 
are interested in Negro Education may become more 
familiar with the problems and difficulties that con- 
front those who labor for the future of a race. I have 
had to endure endless hardships during these twenty- 
five years, in order that thousands of poor negro 
youths might receive an industrial education, — ^boys 
and girls who might have gone into that demoralized 
class that is a disgrace to any people and that 
these friends may continue their interest in not only 
Snow Hill but all the schools of the South that are 
seeking to make better citizens of our people. I also 
hope that the interest may be sustained until the State 
and Nation realize that it is profitable to educate the 
black child as well as the white. 

To me, these have been twenty-five years of self 
denial, of self sacrifice, of deprivation, even of suffer- 
ing, but when I think of the results, I am still encour- 
aged to go on ; when I think of the work that Mr. Mc- 
Duffie is doing at Laurinburg, N. C, Brown at Eich- 
mond, Ala., Knight at Evergreen, Ala., Mitchell at W. 
Butler, Ala., Carmichael at Perdue Hill, Ala., Brister 
at Selma, Ala., and hundreds of others, I feel that the 
sacrifice has not been in vain, so I continue believing 



xii PREFACE 

that after all the great heart of the American people 
is on the right side. I think that to-day, the Negro 
faces the dawn, — not the twilight, — the morning, — not 
the evening. 

In my passionate desire to hasten that time and with 
the crying needs of my race at heart, I choose this op- 
portunity for making an appeal in their behalf. 

"Lord, and what shall this man do?" (John 21.) 

Man is a relative being and should be thus consid- 
ered. The status of my brother then will always serve 
as a standard of value by which my own conduct can 
be measured ; by his standard mine may become either 
high or low, broad or narrow, deep or shallow. This 
is the theory that underlies all humanitarian work. 
This is the great dynamic force of the Christian life. 

No question is being asked by the American people 
more earnestly today than this one : "Lord, What shall 
this man, the Negro, do, — this black man upon whom 
centuries of ignorance have left their marks?" He 
has made a faithful slave, a courageous soldier, and 
when trained and educated, an industrious and law- 
abiding citizen, yet he is troubled on every side. What 
shall he do? Uneducated, undisciplined, untrained, he 
is often ferocious or dangerous; he makes a criminal 
of the lowest type for he is the product of ignorance. 

Crime has increased in proportion as educational 
privileges have been withdrawn. This brings the 
Negro face to face with a most dangerous criminal 
force. What shall this man do? It is true that the 
white man is further up on the ladder of civilization 
than the Negro, but the Negro desires to climb and has 
made rapid strides, according to his chances. 



PREFACE xiii 

Christ's answer to Peter was, ''What is that to thee, 
follow thou Me." John's future welfare evidently 
depended upon Peter's ability to follow Christ. So 
the future work and welfare of the Negro in the 
Black-Belt of the South depend largely upon the 
Christian work of the southern white man. The Negro 
needs justice and mercy from the courts of the land 
and asks for equal rights in educational opportunities. 

We admit that there is a difference between the 
white man and the Negro, but the difference is not 
as great as was the difference between Christ and 
His disciples. We admit that the white man is above 
the Negro, but not so high as was Christ above His 
disciples. The very fact that Christ was superior to 
His disciples served to Him as a reason why He should 
minister unto them. The superiority of the white 
man to his black brother can only be shown by the white 
man's willingness to minister unto him. Lord, what 
shall this black man do? 

Many great problems confront the people of the 
rural South, namely, this Negro Problem and the prob- 
lem of sufficient labor supply. In a practical way I 
wish to consider the relation of the Negro to the labor 
problem of the rural South. It is a fact that today 
many of the best farms of the South have been turned 
into pastures because of the lack of labor ; other farms 
have been sold, and still others are growing up in 
weeds because there is no one to till them. This 
condition obtains in a very marked degree in almost 
every southern state. Certainly in most of the Agri- 
cultural Sections. 

Before investigating the cause of this condition, men 



xiv PREFACE 

of influence and power have hastened to proclaim 
through the press and otherwise, that the responsibil- 
ity rests upon the Negro. They say that the Negro is 
lazy, worthless, criminal and will not work and there- 
fore they are compelled to have immigrants to work 
these fields. That there are lazy, worthless and crim- 
inal Negroes, we do not deny, but we do deny that as 
a race they are such. 

The facts are these: first, the South, unlike other 
sections of the country, has not had thousands of im- 
migrants to come into her borders year after year to 
do her work, but has depended solely upon the increase 
in her native population for this purpose. This in- 
crease has not kept pace with the marvellous growth 
and development of that section, hence, the cry for 
labor. Second, scarcity of labor in that section is due 
in part, to ignorance and a false idea of real freedom. 
Men with such ideas do not work long in any one place, 
but rove from section to section and work enough to 
keep themselves living. This labor is not only un- 
profitable to the individual, but is not satisfactory to 
the employers. Third, the labor trouble in the rural 
South is due mostly to the way in which the landlords 
and merchants treat their tenants and customers. 

The great mass of Negroes in the South either rent 
the lands or work them on shares. This rent varies 
according to the kind of crops that are made. If the 
tenant makes a good crop this year, he must expect to 
pay more rent the next year, or his farm will be rented 
to another at higher figures. Of course, the Negroes 
are ignorant and are unable to keep their own ac- 
counts. Sometimes these Negro farmers pay as much 



PREFACE XV 

as 50%, 75% and 100% on the goods and provisions 
which they consume during the year. 

This method of renting lands and selling goods ac- 
cording to the condition of the crops, is repeated year 
after year. I know ignorant farmers who have been 
working under these conditions for twenty-five and 
thirty years, who have never been able to get more 
than $15 or $20 in any one year during this period. 
These are not worthless and shiftless Negroes, but 
persons who work hard from Monday morning until 
Saturday night. As a rule, they are on their farms at 
sunrise, and remain there until sunset. They have 
their dinners brought to them in the fields. I have 
seen small families grow into large ones under these 
conditions. I have also seen infants grow to manhood 
under same. Now, these people who have been work- 
ing in this way for twenty-five and thirty years are 
becoming discouraged. When you ask them why they 
do not ditch, fertilize, and improve their farms, their 
answer is, that if they do this, the next year they will 
either have to pay more rent or hunt another home 
for themselves. 

It seems to be the policy of the landlords and the 
merchants of the rural South to keep their tenants 
and customers in debt. It is this abominable method 
of the landlords and tenants of the rural South more 
than anything else, that has caused many of the best 
farming lands there to be turned into pastures, others 
to be sold at sheriff sale, and still others to be grow- 
ing up in weeds. Another menace is loss of fertility 
of the soil. 

The problem is, how can we stop these people from 



xvi PREFACE 

leaving the country for the cities and other places of 
public works and again reclaim these waste fields? It 
was once thought that the places of these Negroes 
could be supplied by immigrants from foreign coun- 
tries, but this hope is now almost abandoned. In fact, 
the few immigrants who have gone into that section 
have, in many instances, been oppressed almost as 
much as the Negroes, many have gone to other parts 
of the country or have returned to their homes. 
So we find ourselves face to face with large and fertile 
agricultural areas in the South with no labor to till 
them. 

The remedy of these evils lies in the Negro himself. 
He is best suited to the work, best adapted to the cli- 
mate, and understands the southern white man better 
than anyone else. Furthermore, he knows the white 
man,- knows his disposition and inclinations, and 
therefore, knows what is so called his place. He feels 
that justice is wanting in the courts of the South and 
he therefore tries to avoid all troubles. Most of all, 
he prays for a chance to work and educate his chil- 
dren. He labors and waits thus patiently because he 
has faith in the American people. He believes that 
ere long the righteous indignation of this people will 
be aroused and like the great wave of prohibition, 
will sweep this country from center to circumference, 
and then every man will be awarded according to his 
several abilities. 

These waste places can be reclaimed and the gut- 
tered hills made to blossom, only by giving the Negro 
a common education combined with religious, moral 
and industrial training and the opportunity to at least 



PREFACE xvii 

own his home, if not the land he cultivates. The 
Negro must be taught to believe that the farmer can 
become prosperous and independent ; that he can own 
his home and educate his children in the country. If 
he can, and he can be taught these things, in less than 
ten years, every available farm in the rural South 
will be occupied. 

WILLIAM J. EDWARDS. 



TWENTY-FIVE YEARS IN THE 
BLACK BELT 



TWENTY-FIVE YEARS IN 
THE BLACK BELT 



CHAPTER 1. 

Childhood Days. 

All that I know of mv ancestors was told to me by 
my people. I learned from my grandfather on my 
mother's side that the family came to Alabama from 
South Carolina. He told me that his mother was 
owned by the Wrumphs who lived in South Carolina, 
but his father belonged to another family. For some 
cause, the Wrumphs decided to move from South 
Carolina to Alabama; this caused his mother and fa- 
ther to be separated, as his father remained in South 
Carolina. The new home was near the village of 
Snow Hill. This must have been in the Thirties when 
my grandfather was quite a little child. He had no 
hope of ever seeing his father again, but his father 
worked at nights and in that way earned enough 
money to purchase his freedom from his master. So 
after four or five years he succeeded in buying his 
own freedom from his master and started out for Ala- 
bama. When he arrived at Snow Hill, he found his 
family, and Mr. Wrumphs at once hired him as a driv- 
er. He remained with his family until his death, which 



2 TWENTY-FIVE YEAKS 

occurred during the war. At his death one of his sons, 
George, was appointed to take his place as driver. 

As I now remember, my grandfather told me that 
his mother's name was Phoebe and that she lived until 
the close of the war. My grandfather married a 
woman by the name of Rachael and she belonged to a 
family by the name of Sigh. His wife's mother came 
directly from Africa and spoke the African language. 
It is said that when she became angry no one could 
understand what she said. Her owner allowed her 
to do much as she pleased. 

My grandfather had ten children, my mother being 
the oldest girl. She married my father during the war 
and, as nearly as I can remember, he told me that it 
was in 1864. Three children were born to them and I 
was the youngest ; there was a girl and another boy. 

I know little of my father's people, excepting that 
he repeatedly told me that they came from South 
Carolina. So it is, that while I can trace my ancestry 
back to my great-grandparents on my mother's side, 
I can learn nothing beyond my grandparents on my 
father's side. My grandfather was a local preacher 
and could read quite well. Just how he obtained this 
knowledge, I have never been able to learn. He had 
the confidence and respect of the best white and col- 
ored people in the community and sometimes he would 
journey eight or ten miles to preach. Many times at 
these meetings there were nearly as many whites as 
colored people in the audience. He was indeed a 
grand old man. His name was James and his fa- 
ther's name was Michael. So after freedom he took 
the name of James Carmichael. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 3 

One of the saddest things about slavery was the 
separation of families. Very often I come across men 
who tell me that they were sold from Virginia, South 
Carolina or North Carolina, and that they had large 
families in those states. Since their emancipation, 
many of these have returned to their former states 
in search of their families, and while some have suc- 
ceeded in finding them, there are those who have not 
been able to find any trace of their families and have 
come back again to die. 

Sometimes we hear people attempt to apologize for 
slavery, but slavery at its best was hard and cruel. 
Often the old slaves tell me of their bitter experience. 
Even today, there are everywhere in the South many 
ex-slaves who lived their best days before and during 
the civil war. Many of these men and women found 
themselves alone at the close of the war, having been 
sold away from their families while they were slaves. 

I was born at Snow Hill, Wilcox County, Alabama, 
September 12th, 1869, three-quarters of a mile east 
of where Snow Hill Institute now stands. My mother 
died September 9th, 1870, at which time I lacked three 
days of being one year old. From all I can learn my 
mother was very religious. She was a great praying 
woman and almost at every meeting held in the neigh- 
borhood she would be called upon to pray. In fact, 
she was sent for miles around to pray at these meet- 
ings. My mother's death left my father with three 
children, I being the youngest. He succeeded in get- 
ting his mother, who was cooking for her white peo- 
ple in Selma, Alabama, to come and take us in charge. 
My name was Ulyses Grant Edwards, but my grand- 



4 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

mother, who had been with white people since eman- 
cipation, changed my name to William. I afterward 
added to this my grandfather's name of James. 

My father went away to work and I remained with 
my grandmother. We lived about one mile from the 
''quarter," — that is, the collection of slaves' cabins. 
We had about three acres of ground cleared around 
our cabin and my grandmother and I farmed. I do 
not know how old I was when I began working, for I 
have been a farm hand ever since I could remember 
anything. We usually made one bale of cotton each 
year and about twenty-five or thirty bushels of com. 
Sometimes my grandfather would do our plowing and 
at other times, — as we had no stock, — my grand- 
mother and I worked out for others to get our plow- 
ing done. 

In the summer time it w^as the custom for little 
Negro boys to wear only one garment, a shirt. Some- 
times, however, my grandmother would be unable to 
get one for me and in that case she would take a 
crocus sack or corn sack and put two holes in it for 
my arms and one for my head. In putting on a sack 
shirt for the first time the sensation w^as extremely 
irritating. It seemed as if a thousand pins were stick- 
ing me all at once, but after a few days it would be- 
come all right and I could wear it comfortably. For 
several summers this was my only garment. 

Sometimes we would raise a pig during the summer 
to kill in the winter and sometimes we had a cow to 
milk. At such times we had plenty to eat, but at other 
times we had neither a pig nor a cow and then we had 
hard times in the way of getting something to eat. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 5 

Some days our only diet was coni-bread and corn 
coffee. 

When I was old enough, I was sent to school for two 
or three months each winter. Here again I had a hard 
time, as we usually carried our dinner in a little tin 
bucket. Sometimes I had nothing but bread and when 
recess came for dinner, I went away by myself and ate 
my bread and drank water. As long as I could keep 
out of the way of the other children, no one was the 
wiser and I did not mind it, but some of the children 
began to watch me and in that way found that I had 
nothing but bread, and when they told the others, they 
would laugh and make fun of me. This would make 
me feel badly and sometimes I cried, but I did not stop 
school for this. My one desire was to learn to read 
the Bible for my old grandmother, who like my 
mother, was very religious. At last I was able to read 
the Bible for her. She would listen for hours and too, 
she would sing such songs as, ''Roll, Jordan Roll." 

Saturdays were mill days and I had to take the corn 
on my shoulder and go to the mill, which was four or 
five miles awav. It alwavs took me from four to five 
hours to make this trip, as I had to stop by the way 
several times to rest. 

By this time my brother and sister were large 
enough to do good work on the farm. My grandfather 
and grandmother for whom they were working, now 
desired to take them wholly from my old grand- 
mother. The Justice of the Peace said that the chil- 
dren might decide the matter. My brother chose to 
go to my grandfather's but my sister came back home 
with the grandmother who had reared us from in- 



6 TWENTY-FIVE YEAES 

fants. Of course, I did not go to court, because they 
all knew that there was no chance of my leaving my 
grandmother. 

In the early spring of 1880 while on one of my trips 
to the mill the thought dawned upon me that my 
grandmother was very old and must soon die. I cried 
all the way to the mill and back. I could not see how 
I would live after she was gone. I did not tell anybody 
why I was crying. On a June night, she became se- 
verely ill and died. All she said to us during her ill- 
ness was: ''Children, I have been waiting for this 
hour a long time." 

After the death of my grandmother, her daughter 
Marina Rivers, who was herself a widow and well on 
in years, came to live with us that year. I soon learned 
to love her as I had my grandmother and never once 
thought of leaving her for my mother's people. We 
gathered the crop that fall and when all was over, my 
father, whom I had not seen for five or six years, came 
to carry my sister and myself to Selma, where he was 
staying. The thought of going to the city filled me 
with joy and the time to go could not come too soon 
for me. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 



CHAPTER 2. 

Shadows. 

We arrived in Selma several days before Christ- 
mas. Here everything was strange to me, as I had 
never been in a city before. I did not know any one 
and it was not long before I was crying to return to 
Snow Hill. My father gave me to understand then, 
that Selma was my home now and that I should not 
be permitted to return to Snow Hill. He said 
that he was going to put me in school when the New 
Year came, but when the time came nothing was said 
about school. He gave us little care and often we 
were in need of food and clothes. 

After spending a few weeks doing nothing, I went 
out one day to hunt for work and succeeded in getting 
a job at the compress, where they reduced the size of 
a bale of cotton by one-half and clipped the tires. My 
job was to straighten out the bent tires. I got twenty- 
five cents a day for this. That week I made one dollar 
and fifty cents. This was the most money I had ever 
had. I spent almost all of it for provisions and that 
night my sister cooked a great supper. Finally, my 
father said that he would save my wages for me, but 
if he did he has it still, as I never have seen any that 
he collected. 

I had not been in Selma long before I was taken ill. 
That misfortune changed my whole life, I had no 



8 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

medical attendance and suffered greatly. Sometimes 
I prayed and sometimes I cried. The news reached 
Snow Hill that I was sick and not being cared for. As 
soon as she could, my aunt Rina came to Selma for 
me and carried me home. 

On my return to Snow Hill I was sick and ema- 
ciated, but few people welcomed me. Many tried to 
discourage my aunt for bringing me back. They gave 
me about three months to live. I was glad to be at 
home again and had the consolation of knowing that 
should I die I would be buried in the old burying 
ground. 

I was unable at the time to do any work on the farm, 
so I was put to the task of raising chickens. I took 
personal interest in the little chicks. I had a name for 
each one of them. I would follow them around the 
yard and see them work for their food. "When I was 
weary of this I would go to an old deserted cabin 
nearby, taking a few old books and the Bible; there 
unmolested I would spend hours at a time reading the 
Bible and pondering over the books. One of the books 
was an old Davies' Practical Arithmetic. Nothing 
gave me more pleasure than working out new sums 
for the first time. I kept up this practice until I had 
read the New Testament through several times and 
had worked every problem in the arithmetic. In addi- 
tion to this I would gather up wood and carry it home 
for the people to cook with. 

My aunt and her daughter were very poor and had 
to work each day for what they could get to eat. It 
pained me because I could not go out and work for 
something to eat as I had done in Selma. I never ate 



m 



IN THE BLACK BELT 9 

a full meal although my aunt and her daughter in- 
sisted upon my doing so; I felt that I had no right to 
eat up what they had worked so hard to get, while I 
was doing nothing that was worth while. My aunt's 
daughter had a son who was one month older than I; 
he was well grown for his age and always was the 
picture of health. We all lived in a one-room cabin 
and there were three beds in it, besides it was the 
kitchen and dining-room as well. My aunt and her 
daughter wanted me to sleep at nights with their boy, 
but he objected, so I would not force myself upon him. 
I asked them to give me one or two old quilts and I 
would spread these upon the floor of the cabin at night 
for my bed. I would get up early and roll them up 
and store them away in some dark corner of the cabin 
until the next night. I slept in this manner for sev- 
eral years. 

After I had been at home for several months and 
my condition did not improve, my aunt went about 
begging people for nickels and dimes to take me to 
the local physician. I think she raised about three 
dollars in this way and succeeded in getting a doctor 
to treat me, but he gave my aunt to understand that 
she had to pay cash for each treatment. 

I shall never forget one Sunday when a great many 
of the neighbors came to our home, they began telling 
my aunt what they would do with me if they were in 
her place. At the time I was in the back-yard watch- 
ing the chicks. Some one said that she should send 
me to the poorhouse, others said that she had done so 
much for me, it was time that some of my other people 
should take me and share in the burden, while others 



10 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

said that I should be driven away and go wherever I 
could find shelter. I was so offended at hearing this 
that I hobbled down the hill and there under a pine 
tree, which now stands, I prayed for an hour or more 
for God to let me die. After this prayer I lay down, 
folded my arms and closed my eyes, to see if my 
prayer would be answered. After waiting for awhile 
I finally decided to get up and I felt better then than 
I had felt for several months. I have made many 
prayers since then, but never since have I prayed to 
die. 

None of the solicitations and advices from our good 
friends could change my aunt's attitude towards me. 
In fact, she was more determined now than ever to 
care for me. The next year she rented a little patch 
and worked it as best she could and that fall she 
cleared a little money. As the local physician had 
done me no good, she took me to Dr. George Keyser 
who lived in the town of Richmond, eight or ten miles 
away. Dr. Keyser had the reputation of being the best 
physician in that section of the state and people would 
come for twenty-five and thirty miles around to be 
treated by him. But we had also heard that he was a 
man who would not treat any one without having his 
money down. As I remember, my aunt paid him five 
dollars on the first visit and each time after that she 
would send whatever she could get. I used to borrow 
a mule from one of the neighbors to ride to see him. 
Sometimes when my medicine gave out and I had to 
go without any money, I would pray to God the whole 
distance that he might soften the doctor's heart so 
that he would let me have my medicine. I don't know 



•I! 



IN THE BLACK BELT 11 

whether my prayers were needed or not, but I do 
know that the doctor always treated me kindly and 
finally he told me that I could be treated whenever my 
medicine gave out, money or no money. He treated 
me in this way until the early fall of '84 when he told 
my aunt that I needed an operation and she must try 
and get me a place to stay nearby so that he could 
see me daily. After looking around she found on 
the doctor's place an old fellow-servant, that is, an 
old lady who belonged to the same man my aunt did 
in slavery time. Her name was Lucy George ; she was 
near the age of my aunt, and had never been married. 
They were indeed glad to meet and she readily con- 
sented to take me to her little cabin where she lived 
alone. The doctor visited his plantation two or three 
times a week and usually came to see me. He operated 
on me twice during my stay there. 

"In 1883 the subject of this sketch, W. J. Edwards, was sent to 
me by his aunt, Rina Rivers, for medical treatment. He had been 
sick for several months from scrofula and it had affected the bone 
of his left arm (hinneras) near the elbow joint, and the heel bone 
(OS calcis) of his left foot. It was with much difficulty and pain 
that he walked at all. 

The boy was kind, courteous and polite to every one, white and 
colored, and all sympathized with him in his great affliction, and 
manifested their sympathy in a very substantial way, by sending 
him many good things to eat. This enabled me to build up his 
general health. 

I had to remove the dead bone (necrosed bone) from his arm and 
heel many times. He always stood the operation patiently and 
manifested so great a desire to get well, I kept him near me a long 
time and patiently watched his case. 

After four years' treatment his heel cured up nicely, and he was 
enabled to walk very well, and the following fall he picked cotton. 
With prudence, care and close application to cotton picking, he saved 
money enough to very nearly pay his medical account, and his fare 
to Booker Washington's School at Tuskegee, Alabama. 

The work of this pupil of Booker Washington, — carried on under 



12 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

adverse circumstances, — is worthy of emulation. He has, and is 
now, doing much good work for his race. He has won tlie confi- 
dence and esteem of all the white and colored citizens of this sec- 
tion of the country. He is a remarkable man. a great benefactor to 
his race, and it affords me great pleasure to testify as to his history 
and character, Mr, R. O, Simpson, on whose plantation he lived 
and who aided him materially, — is one of the Trustees of his In- 
stitute." 

George W. Keyseb, M, D, 

Richmond, Dallas County, Alabama. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 13 



CHAPTER 3. 

A Ray of Light. 

For three months after my first operation I could 
not walk. My aunt would come from Snow Hill once 
a week to bring my rations and to see how I was get- 
ting along. I always cried when she went home. 

During my first month's stay on the doctor's place, 
*'Aunt Lucy" George with whom I lived, was at 
home most of the time, but when the cotton season 
came on, she had to go to the doctor's field, which was 
a mile away, to pick cotton. This left me alone for 
five days in the week. ''Aunt Lucy" would get up 
early and prepare her breakfast, take her lunch to 
the field with her, and would not return until night. 
She would also leave me something to eat, and I could 
crawl about the house and get such other things as I 
needed. 

The first few davs that I was alone were the most 
miserable days of my life. I tried to walk, but fainted 
once or twice at these attempts, so I had to be con- 
tented with crawling. Soon, however, I began crawl- 
ing about the yard. I found several red ants' nests 
within about twenty or twenty-five yards of the house, 
and soon made friends of the ants. I would crawl 
from nest to nest and watch them do their work. I 
became so interested in them that I would spend the 



14 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

whole day watching and following them abont the 
yard. I would be anxious for the nights to pass that 
I might return to them the next day. 

I found that the ants worked by classes. One class 
would bring out the dirt, another would go out in 
search of food, another would take away the dead, an- 
other would over look those that worked, and still an- 
other class, though few in numbers, would come out 
and look around and then return. These had much 
larger heads than the average. Some few, however, 
with great heads, would come out once or twice a day. 
I never learned what their business was, as they did 
not seem to do much of anything. They very seldom 
went more than a few inches from the nests. I no- 
ticed, too, that those that went in search of food and 
failed to get it, would come back to the nests and stand 
around and consult with the guards and then would 
return. They did this several times. Sometimes they 
would go away and get into the weeds and rest awhile. 
However, when they saw others coming, they would 
start out again. Sometimes, after making several 
trips without success, I would give them crumbs of 
bread, and they would hasten away to their nests. 
They never hesitated when they had food, but would 
run right in. This was great fun for me, and I spent 
most of the remainder of my time in this manner. 

This was during the fall of '84. By the first week in 
December I had recovered sufficiently to be able to 
walk very well with a stick and could do a little work. 
I then returned to Snow Hill with my aunt, and, 
though I was anxious to return home, I hated very 
much to leave my little friends. I got home in time to 
make toy wagons for my Christmas money. || 



IN THE BLACK BELT 15 

The following year, although far from being well, 
I could do a little work on my aunt's farm. I ought 
not to call it a farm, because it was only a few acres 
which she rented from one of the tenants on Mr. 
Simpson's plantation. The habit of sub-renting was 
very prevalent on this plantation. A tenant with one 
mule would rent twenty-five acres, if he had two 
mules he would rent fifty acres. Now in order to get 
work done on his farm, he would sub-rent four or five 
acres, to some one who would do this work for him. 
It was in this way that my aunt could get land to work. 
We usually made on these few acres about twenty 
bushels of corn and sometimes a half a bale or a whole 
bale of cotton. 

Having to work for our plowing and to pay the rent 
of the land, we had but little chance to do much work 
for ourselves. "We very seldom had enough to eat. 
Some days we would work from the rising of the sun 
until dark without anything but water. Then my aunt 
would go out among the neighbors in the evening and 
borrow a little corn meal or get a little on condition 
that she would work to pay for it the next day. While 
my aunt would go to hunt for the bread I would go out 
and beg for some milk from some of our friends. I 
would always add water to my milk to make it go a 
long way. This bread and half-water-and-milk con- 
stituted our supper for many nights. 

In spite of these hard times I always found time to 
study my books. Sometimes I borrowed books from 
the boys and girls who had them. We were too poor 
to buy oil so I would go to the woods and get a kind 
of pine that we called light-wood. This would make 



16 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

an excellent light and I could study some nights until 
twelve o'clock. When the blackberries, peaches, ap- 
ples and plums were ripe, we fared better, as these 
grew wild and we could have a plenty of them to eat. 
As the season came for the com to mature, we would 
sometimes make a meal of green corn. When the corn 
became too hard for us to use in this way, we used to 
make a grater out of an old piece of tin and would 
grate the corn and make meal of it in this way until 
it was hard enough to go to the mill. 

When the cotton picking season came on we could 
pick cotton for the neighbors and in that way could 
have a plenty to eat. They paid fifty cents a hundred 
pounds for picking cotton. I sometimes picked two 
hundred pounds a day, but by picking at night, I occa- 
sionally got almost three hundred. We children 
thought it great fun to go into the swamps at night to 
pick cotton. We would go at seven o'clock in the eve- 
ning and spend the whole night in the cotton fields. 
When we got sleepy we would lie down in the cotton 
row with our cotton sacks under our heads. We would 
sleep a few hours and get up and begin picking again. 
In the swamps at night the owls and frogs made 
plenty of music for us. Such was my life for several 
years. 

During all these years the one thing uppermost in 
my mind was the desire to attend some school, but I 
could not see how I would ever be able to do so. I 
had heard much of Talladega College, the school at 
Normal and the state school at Montgomery, but board 
at these schools was from seven to eight dollars per 
month and this had to be paid in cash. This, of 



IN THE BLACK BELT 17 

course, would keep me out, as I could never see how 
I could get so much money. 

It was during the month of August '87 that I first 
heard of Tuskegee. There was a revival meeting go- 
ing on at one of the churches at Snow Hill. I was 
determined to visit this meeting. I did not have suit- 
able clothes, neither did I have any shoes, so my peo- 
ple told me that I would not be able to attend church. 

I had not been to church in seven years, and I was 
very anxious to hear some preaching. Notices were 
sent out that on a Wednesday night a Presiding Elder 
would speak. This man had the reputation of being 
a great preacher. All of our people prepared early, 
and went to church. When I thought the services had 
begun, I too went. Though I was far from being well, 
I did not have much trouble in reaching there. I did 
not go in, however, but went around to the rear of the 
church. The building was a large, box-like cottage, 
and contained many cracks. One could hear as well 
on the outside as on the inside. I stood directly be- 
hind the pulpit and heard all that the preacher said. 

At the close of his sermon he spoke of the school at 
Tuskegee, where, he said, poor boys and girls could 
go without money and without price, and work for an 
education. From that night I decided to go to Tuske- 
gee. Before the meeting closed, I returned home, and 
when the others got there, I was in my place fast 
asleep. I wrote Mr. Washington the next day, and he 
sent me a catalogue immediately. 



18 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 4. 

Life at Tuskegee. 

In the fall of '87 I told my aunt that I wanted to go 
to Tuskegee the next year, and that in addition to her 
little farm, I wanted to rent an acre of land and work 
it for that purpose. She encouraged me in this idea 
and said that she wished so much that she could do 
something for me that was worth while, but she was 
poor and could do hut little, as she was now well ad- 
vanced in years. She said, however, that she would 
help me to work my patch. 

About this time I learned that my brother Washing- 
ton, who had been away for a number of years, was 
living at Hazen, Alabama, about fifty miles northeast 
of Snow Hill. He was working in the bridge-gang on 
a railroad and was making good money. I learned 
also that my father and sister had died several years 
before. Now as there were but two of us, and I was 
cripple, I thought that I would write my brother and 
get him to help me go to Tuskegee. So I started out 
for Hazen and reached there after two days' journey 
on foot. My brother did not seem to care for me and 
gave me no encouragement whatever. This was a 
sore disappointment to me and I did not remain there 
more than a few days. I returned to Snow Hill very 
much discouraged, but the warmth with which my old 



IN THE BLACK BELT 19 

aunt greeted and welcomed me back home, helped me 
much. 

Soon we were all busy getting ready to plant our 
little farms. That year there were four of us still liv- 
ing in the one room log cabin, my aunt, her daughter, 
her grandson and myself. Each of us had a little 
farm. About mid-summer when our provisions had 
given out, my aunt's daughter and her son mortgaged 
their crops for something to eat, and wanted that we 
should do the same, but I would not agree to do so. 
This, of course, made it hard for me to get anything 
to eat. My cousin and her son were perfectly willing 
that their mother and grandmother should share 
in their provisions, but would see to it that I got none. 
I did not think hard of them for this, because I felt 
that I had no right to what they had. I continued to 
live on water and bread, and sometimes I would get a 
little milk from the neighbors as I had formerly done. 
I asked them, however, if I might have the water in 
which they boiled their vegetables whenever they had 
a boiled dinner. "We called this water *'pot liquor." 
Of course, they readily consented to this and some- 
times I would get enough of this liquor to last me two 
or three days. In fact, I was poorly nourished all the 
time. 

About this time someone came through the county 
selling clocks, on condition that we pay for them later 
in the fall. I objected to this but the other members 
of the family over-ruled my objections and the clock 
was bought on the condition stated above. The clock 
cost $12 and each of us agreed to pay $3.00 each. 
When the time came to pay for this clock no one had 



20 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

any money, and so I paid what I had saved to prepare 
myself for Tuskegee. I thought now that I would 
never get to that school as I had spent most of my 
money in paying for a worthless clock. However, I 
picked cotton day and night for almost two weeks, and 
succeeded in making all the money back which I had 
spent for the clock. I was now able to finish paying 
Dr. Keyser and get a few clothes and start for Tuske- 
gee. For a long time the people in the quarter did 
not believe that I was going, and many tried to dis- 
courage me. Had it not been for my aunt's encourag- 
ing words and sincere efforts, I believe that I could 
not have overcome the efforts of others to keep me 
from going. When, however, they all found that I 
was determined to go, they all became my friends and 
each would give me a nickel or a dime to help me off. 

The night before I left for Tuskegee, one of the 
neighbors told me that while he did not have anything 
to give me, he had a contract to get a cord of wood to 
the woodyard for the train by six o'clock the next 
morning and if I would take his team and haul it, he 
would give me one dollar for my services. I agreed 
to do it and at two o'clock the next morning I was at 
his home hitching up the team to haul the wood. I 
had to go about two miles for the wood and there was 
a very heavy frost that morning. By five o'clock T 
had hauled the wood and had the team back to my 
neighbor's home waiting for my dollar. I thought 
this to be the coldest morning that I had ever experi- 
enced up to that time. I then got my few things to- 
gether and was off for school. 

I reached Tuskegee the first day of '89. I found 



IN THE BLACK BELT 21 

things there very strange indeed. Hundreds of stu- 
dents were going to and fro. Some were playing foot- 
ball, others were having band practice, and still others 
were going around doing nothing, as the first day of 
the New Year was a holiday. I was placed with a 
crowd of boys from Pensacola, Fla. I learned after- 
wards that they were the roughest boys in school. 
They made it very unpleasant for me, so much so that 
I decided to return home. In going back to the office 
I met Mr. Washington for the first time. He wanted 
to know why I was not satisfied, and after I told him 
my troubles, he said that he would remedy them. I 
was deeply impressed with him and from that day to 
this, I loved him as a father. He changed my room 
and I found a crowd of very congenial boys. 

The next ordeal through which I was to pass, was 
going into the dining-room and using knives and 
forks, but I avoided all humiliation by simply watch- 
ing. I have made it a rule of my life to never be the 
first to try new things, nor the last to lay old ones 
aside. 

After supper, I was worried about sleeping. I had 
heard the boys talking about night shirts and I knew I 
had none; in fact, I did not know their purpose. So 
when time came to retire, one of the boys in my room 
who had several, gave me one, then I was undecided 
just whether it was to go over my day shirt or over my 
undershirt, but I did not want to ask how it should 
be worn, so I decided to sit up until some one had gone 
to bed and by watching him I knew I would learn just 
how to use mine. In this way I came through all right. 
The habit of using the tooth-brush was not so hard. 



22 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

The next day the regular routine work of the school 
began and I was given my examination. I took exam- 
ination for the B-Middle class. This is the second 
year normal. Miss Annie C. Hawley of Portland, 
Maine, who was then a teacher there, gave me the ex- 
amination. I made the class in all of the subjects ex- 
cept grammar. Of this subject I knew absolutely 
nothing. I did not know what a sentence was. I could 
not tell the subject from the predicate, so I was put 
back two years into what is called the A-Prep. class. 

After my examination I was assigned to my work. 
I was placed in the tin shop, which was then being 
placed as one of the industries, under Mr. Lewis 
Adams. I was the first student to work in this shop, 
but it did not take two days to learn that I could 
never be a tinsmith. Next I was assigned to the print- 
ing office, but here too I found that I could never be- 
come a printer; so finally, I was put on the farm and 
there I remained during my whole stay at Tuskegee. 
The farm manager at that time, Mr. C. W. Green, had 
charge of the brick-yard, poultry, dairy, landscape 
gardening, horticulture, as well as the general farm 
and truck-farm. I worked some in all of these depart- 
ments and enjoyed my work immensely. I considered 
the work in the brick-yard as being the hardest of all 
and that was the only work which I could not do with- 
out suffering great pain because of my physical con- 
dition. Still I was willing to endure suffering if by 
so doing I could obtain an education. 

I did not go to night school because I was given ex- 
tra work, such as keeping the clocks on the campus 
regulated and making fires in the girls' buildings, and 



jii 



IN THE BLACK BELT 23 

too, they had a system of electric bells which were 
used for the passing of classes, and I kept these in 
order. In this way I worked enough each month to 
pay my board and stay in day school. Of course, I 
did not have, or get any money for my work, but I 
did not worry about that. Miss Maggie Murray (af- 
terwards Mrs. Washington) kept me well supplied 
with clothes from the supply of second hand garments 
which came to the school from northern friends. 

The remainder of the time that 1 was at Tuskegee 
was spent in practically the same way that I have al- 
ready described. Many of the students would com- 
plain about the food, but the fact that I was getting 
three regular meals a day was enough for me. And 
too, I was now sleeping in a bed, something that I 
seldom had done. 

When burning bricks they would pay students cash 
for working at night, and it was by this work that I 
got a little money now and then. It usually takes 
from seven to eight days to burn a kiln of brick and 
sometimes I would work every night until the kiln had 
been burned. 

The one thing that made the deepest impression on 
me while at Tuskegee was Mr. Washington's Sunday 
evening talks to the students. He used to tell us that 
after getting our education we should return to our 
homes and there help the people. Ho said that the 
people were supporting Tuskegee in order that we 
might be able to help the masses of our people. I 
could understand every word he said, and too, I felt 
always that he was talking directly to me. These 
talks of Dr. Washington's changed the course of my 



24 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

whole life and they are responsible for my being at 
the Snow Hill School today. 

It was when I reached the senior class that I came 
in personal touch with Dr. Washington, as he taught 
that class in two or three subjects. Here I could 
study him as I was never able to do before. He had 
a thorough grasp upon all subjects he taught and 
would accept nothing but the same from his students. 

As the time was nearing for my graduation, I was 
deeply worried about my Commencement suit. All 
of the other members of the class were sending home 
for their suits or for the money with which to get 
them, but I knew that my aunt was not able to help 
me, so I was at a loss to know where I should get 
mine. Finally, I decided to write to Mr. R. 0. 
Simpson of Furman, Alabama, the man on whose 
plantation I was reared, and ask him to loan me fif- 
teen dollars. I prayed during the entire time it took 
me to write the letter and when I had sealed it I 
prayed over it again. In two days' time I had an an- 
swer with the fifteen dollars. So all of my troubles 
and worries were banished and I proceeded to get 
ready for Commencement. I graduated second, with 
a class of twenty, on May 17, 1893. Our class motto 
was ** Deeds Not Words." 

The morning of May 18th found me packing my 
few clothes in an old trunk which one of the young 
men had given me, and getting ready to return to 
Snow Hill. All the while I was thinking of what I 
could do to live up to this new training which I had 
received at Tuskegee, and above all, how could I make 
good our class motto: ''Deeds Not Words." Al- 



IN THE BLACK BELT 25 

though it has been now well nigh 25 years since my 
graduation, those words still ring in my ears: "Deeds 
Not Words." I should like so to live that when the 
summons come for me to join Dr. Washington in the 
Great Beyond, these words might be written as an 
epitaph on my tomb: 

"Deeds Not Words. '* 



26 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 5. 
Beconnoitering. 

When I returned from Tuskegee on the 19th of 
May, 1893, I found my old aunt, her daughter and her 
grandson still living in the one-room log cabin in 
which I had left them four and a half years before. 
Their condition was much the same as when I left 
them. My first work was to build another end, a log 
pen, to the one room cabin; this gave us two rooms, 
something we never had before. As it was too late 
for me to pitch a crop, I worked with them until their 
crop was clean of weeds and then I went from farm to 
farm in the neighborhood, helping all the farmers that 
I could. The only pay I received was three meals a 
day wherever I worked. I usually worked from one 
to three days on each farm. All the while I was mak- 
ing a close study of the people's condition. I con- 
tinued working in this way until I was convinced that 
I had a thorough knowledge of their condition. I then 
ventured to carry the investigation into other sections 
of Wilcox County and the adjoining counties. I 
visited most of the places in the counties of Monroe, 
Butler, Dallas and Lowndes. These constitute most 
of the Black Belt counties of the State. I made the 
entire journey on foot. 

It was a bright beautiful morning in July when I 



IN THE BLACK BELT 27 

started from my home, a log cabin. More than two 
hundred Negroes were in the nearby fields plowing 
com, hoeing cotton and singing those beautiful songs 
often referred to as plantation melodies: *'I am go- 
ing to roll in my Jesus' arms," *'0, Freedom," and 
''Before I'd be a Slave, I'd be carried to my Grave." 
With the beautiful fields of corn and cotton out- 
stretched before me, and the shimmering brook like a 
silver thread twining its way through the golden 
meadows, and then through verdant fields, giving 
water to thousands of creatures as it passed, I felt 
that the earth was truly clothed in His beauty and the 
fulness of His glory. 

But I had scarcely gone beyond the limits of the 
field when I came to a thick undergrowth of pines. 
Here we saw old pieces of timber and two posts. 
''This marks the old cotton-gin house," said Uncle 
Jim, my companion, and then his countenance grew 
sad; after a sigh, he said: "I have seen many a Negro 
whipped within an inch of his life at these posts. I 
have seen them whipped so badly that they had to be 
carried away in wagons. Many never did recover." 

From this our road led first up-hill, then down, and 
finally through a stretch of woods until we reached 
CarlowviUe. This was once the most aristocratic 
village of the Southern part of Dallas County. Per- 
haps no one who owned less than a hundred slaves 
was able to secure a home within its borders. Here 
still are to be seen stately mansions and among the 
names of the owners are those of Lyde, Lee, Wrumph, 
Bibb, Youngblood and Reynolds. Many of these 
mansions have been partly rebuilt and remodeled to 



28 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

conform to modem styles of architecture, while others 
have been deserted and are now fast decaying. 
Usually the original families have sold out or many 
have died out. 

In Carlowville stands the largest white church in 
Dallas or Wilcox Counties. It has a seating capacity 
of 1,000, excluding the balcony, which during slavery 
was used exclusively for the Negroes of the families 
attending. 

Our stay in Carlowville was necessarily short, as 
the evening sun was low and the nearest place for 
lodging was two miles ahead. Before reaching this 
place we came to a large one-room log cabin, 30 by 36 
feet on the road-side, with a double door and three 
holes for windows cut in the sides. There was no 
chimney nor anything to show that the room could be 
heated in cold weather. This was the Hopewell Bap- 
tist Church. Here five hundred members congregated 
one Sunday in each month and spent the entire day in 
eating, shouting, and praising God for His goodness 
toward the children of men. Here also the three 
months' school was taught during the winter. A few 
hundred yards beyond this church brought us to the 
home of a Deacon Jones. He was living in the house 
occupied by the overseer of the plantation during 
slavery. It was customary for Deacon Jones to care 
for strangers who chanced to come into the commu- 
nity, especially for the preachers and teachers. So 
here we found rest. At supper Deacon Jones told of 
the many preachers he had entertained and their fond- 
ness for chicken. 

After supper I spent some time in trying to find 



IN THE BLACK BELT 29 

out the real condition of the people in this section. 
Mr. Jones told me how for ten years he had been try- 
ing to buy some land, and had been kept from it more 
than once, but that he was still hopeful of getting the 
right deeds for the land for which he had paid. He 
also told of many families who had recently moved 
into this community. These newcomers had made a 
good start for the year and had promising crops, but 
they were compelled to mortgage their growing crops 
in order to get ''advances" for the year. 

When asked of the schools, he said that there were 
more than five hundred children of school age in his 
to\\Tiship, but not more than two hundred of these had 
attended school the previous winter, and most of these 
for a period not longer than six weeks. He also said 
that the people were very indifferent as to the neces- 
sity of schoolhouses and churches. Quite a few who 
cleared a little money the previous year had spent it 
all in buying whiskey, in gambling, in buying cheap 
jewelry, and for other useless articles. After spend- 
ing two hours in such talk, I retired for the evening. 
Thus ended the first day of my search for first-hand 
information. 

Instead of going farther northward, we turned our 
course westward for the town of Tilden, which is only 
eight miles west of Snow Hill. The road from Car- 
lowville to Tilden is somewhat hilly, but a very pleas- 
ant one, and for miles the large oak trees formed an 
almost perfect arch. 

On reaching Tilden we learned that there would be 
a union meeting of two churches that night. I decided 
that this would give me an opportunity to study the 



30 TWENTY-FIVE YEAKS 

religious life of these people for myself. The mem- 
bers of churches number one and number two assem- 
bled at their respective places at eight o'clock. The 
members of church number two had a short praise 
service and formed a line of procession to march to 
church number one. All the women of the congrega- 
tion had their heads bound in pieces of white cloth, 
and they sang peculiar songs as they marched. When 
the members of church number two were within a few 
hundred yards of the church number one, the singing 
then alternated, and finally, when the members of 
church number two came to church number one, they 
marched around this church three times before enter- 
ing it. 

After entering the church, six sermons were 
preached to the two congregations by six different 
ministers, and at least three of these could not read a 
word in the Bible. Each minister occupied at least 
one hour. Their texts were as often taken from 
Webster's blue-back speller as from the Bible, and 
sometimes this would be held upside down. It was 
about two o'clock in the morning when the services 
were concluded. Here, again, we found no school- 
houses, and the three months' school had been taught 
in one of the little churches. 

The next day we started for Camden, a distance of 
sixteen miles. This section between Tilden and Cam- 
den is perhaps the most fertile section of land in the 
State of Alabama. Taking a southwest course from 
Tilden, I crossed into Wilcox County again, where I 
saw acres of com and miles of cotton, all being culti- 
vated by Negroes. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 31 

The evening was far advanced when we reached 
Camden, but having been there before, we had no dif- 
ficulty in securing lodging. Camden is the seat of 
Wilcox County, and has a population of about three 
thousand. The most costly buildings of the town were 
the courthouse and jail, and these occupied the most 
conspicuous places. Here great crowds of Negroes 
would gather on Saturdays to spend their earnings of 
the week for a fine breakfast or dinner on the follow- 
ing Sunday, or for useless trivialities. 

On Saturday evenings, on the roads leading to and 
from Camden, as from other towns, could be seen 
groups of Negroes gambling here and there, and buy- 
ing and selling whiskey. As the county had voted 
against licensing whiskey-selling, this was a violation 
of tfie law, and often the commission merchant, a Ne- 
gro, was imprisoned for the offense, while those who 
supplied him went free. 

In Camden I found one Negro school-house; this 
was a box-like cottage, 20 by 16 feet, and was sup- 
posed to seat more than one hundred students. This 
school, like those taught in the churches, was opened 
only three months in the year. 

After a two days' stay in Camden, I next visited 
Miller's Ferry on the Alabama River, twelve miles 
west of Camden. The road from Camden is one of the 
best roads in the State, and for miles and miles one 
could see nothing but cotton and com. 

At Miller's Ferry a Negro school-house of ample 
proportions had been built on Judge Henderson's 
plantation. Here the school ran several months in 
the year, and the colored people in the community 



32 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

were prosperous and showed a remarkable degree of 
intelligence. Their church was as attractive as their 
school-house. 

Judge Henderson was for twelve years Probate 
Judge of Wilcox County. He proved to be one of the 
best judges this county has ever had, and even unto 
this day he is admired by all, both white and black, 
rich and poor, for his honesty, integrity, and high 
sense of justice. 

From Judge Henderson's place we traveled south- 
ward to Rockwest, a distance of more than fifteen 
miles. During this journey hundreds of Negroes were 
seen at work in the corn and cotton fields. These 
people were almost wholly ignorant, as they had 
neither schools nor teachers, and their ministers were 
almost wholly illiterate. At Rockwest I found a verj^ 
intelligent colored man, Mr. Darrington, who had at- 
tended school at Selma for a few years. He owned 
his home and ran a small grocer^^ He told of the 
hardships with which he had to contend in building 
up his business, and of the almost hopeless condition 
of the Negroes about there. He said that they usually 
made money each year, but that they did not know 
how to keep it. The merchants would induce them 
to buy buggies, machines, clocks, etc., but would never 
encourage them to buy homes. We were very much 
pleased with the reception which Mr. Darrington gave 
us, and felt ver\^ much like putting into practice our 
State motto, "Here We Rest," at his home, but our 
objective point for the day was Fatama, sixteen miles 
away. 

On our journey that afternoon we saw hundreds of 




n 

K 
H 



O 



a 

<-) 
a: 

>^ 

X 

o 

>^ 

o 

z 



IN THE BLACK BELT 33 

Negro one-room log cabins. Some of these were lo- 
cated in the dense swamps and some on the hills, while 
others were miles away from the public road. Most 
of these people had never seen a locomotive. 

We reached Fatama about seven o'clock that night, 
and here for the first time we were compelled to divide 
our crowd in order to get a night's lodging. Each of 
us had to spend the night in a one-room cabin. It was 
my privilege to spend the night with Uncle Jake, a 
jovial old man, a local celebrity. After telling him of 
our weary journey, he immediately made preparation 
for me to retire. This was done by cutting off my 
bed from the remainder of the cabin by hanging up a 
sheet on a screen. While somewhat inconvenient, my 
rest that night was pleasant, and the next morning 
found me very much refreshed and ready for an- 
other day's journey. Our company assembled at 
Uncle Jake's for breakfast, after which we started 
for Pineapple. 

We found the condition of the Negroes between 
Fatama and Pineapple much the same as that of those 
we had seen the previous day. No school-house was 
to be seen, but occasionally we would see a church at 
the cross-roads. We reached Pineapple late in the 
afternoon. 

From Pineapple we went to Greenville, and from 
Greenville to Fort Deposit, and from Fort Deposit 
we returned to Snow Hill, after having traveled a 
distance of 157 miles and visiting four counties. 

In three of these counties there was a colored pop- 
ulation of 42,810 between the ages of five and twenty 
years, and a white population of 7,608 of the same 



34 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

ages. The Negro school population of Wilcox and 
the seven adjoining counties was 11,623. Speaking 
of public schools in the sense that educators use the 
term, the colored people in this section had none. Of 
course, there were so-called public schools here and 
there, running from three to five months in the year 
and paying the teachers from $7.50 to $18 per month. 
Our trip through this section revealed the follow- 
ing facts: (1) That while many opportunities were 
denied our people, they abused many privileges; (2) 
that there was a colored population, in this section 
visited, of more than 200,000 and a school population 
of 85,499; (3) that the people were ignorant and su- 
perstitious; (4) that the teachers and preachers for 
the most part, were of the same condition; (5) that 
there were no public or private libraries and reading- 
rooms to which they had access; (6) that, strictly 
speaking, there were no public schools and only one 
private one. Now, what can be expected of any people 
in such a condition? Can the blind lead the blind? 
They could not in the days of old, and it is not likely 
that they can now. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 35 



CHAPTER 6. 

Founding the Snow Hill School. 

After this trip through the *' Black Belt" I was 
more convinced than ever before of the great need 
of an Industrial School in the very midst of these peo- 
ple; a school that would correct the erroneous ideas 
the people held of education; a school that would put 
most stress upon the things which the people were 
most likely to have to do with through life; a school 
that would endeavor to make education practical 
rather than theoretical ; a school that would train men 
and women to be good workers, good leaders, good 
husbands, good wives, and finally train them to be fit 
citizens of the State and proper subjects for the King- 
dom of God. 

With this idea the Snow Hill Normal and Industrial 
Institute was started twenty-five years ago in an old 
dilapidated one-room log cabin with one teacher and 
three students, with no State appropriation, and with- 
out any church or society responsible for one dollar 
of its expenses. Aside from this unfortunate state of 
affairs, the condition of the people was miserable. 
This was due partly to poor crops and partly to bad 
management on their part. 

In many instances the tenants were not only unable 
to pay their debts, but were also unable to pay their 
rents. In a few cases the landlords had to provide at 
their own expense provisions for their tenants. This 



36 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

was simply another way of establishing soup-houses 
on the plantations. The idea of buying land was for- 
eign to all of them, and there were not more than 
twenty acres of land owTied by the colored people in 
this whole neighborhood. The churches and schools 
were practically closed, while crime and immorality 
were rampant. The carrying of men and women to 
the chain-gang was a frequent occurrence. These peo- 
ple believed that the end of education was to free their 
children from manual labor. 

They were much opposed to industrial education. 
When the school was started, many of the parents 
came to school and forbade our "working" their chil- 
dren, stating as their objection that their children had 
been working all their lives and that they did not mean 
to send them to school to learn to work. Not only did 
they forbid our having their children work, but many 
took their children out of school rather than allow 
them to do so. A good deal of this opposition was 
kept up by illiterate preachers and incompetent teach- 
ers, who had not had any particular training for their 
profession. In fact, ninety-eight per cent of them 
had attended no school. We continued, however, to 
keep the ''Industrial Plank" in our platform, and 
year after year some industry was added until 
we now have fourteen industries in constant operation. 
Agriculture is the foremost and basic industry of the 
institution. We do this because we are in a farming 
section and ninety-five per cent of the people depend 
upon agriculture for a livelihood. 




a 



IN THE BLACK BELT 37 



CHAPTER 7. 
SmaXiL Beginnings. 

The early years of the school were indeed trying 
ones. There are however in all communities persons 
whose hearts are in the right place. I found it so in 
this case, for while there were many who opposed the 
industrial idea, there were those who stood for it and 
held up our aiTus. I refer to that noble class of old 
colored men who always seek for truth. The men who 
stood so loyally by me in the founding of the school 
were Messrs. Frank Warren, Willis McCants, Ellis 
Johnson, John Thomas, Isaac Johnson, Tom Johnson 
and P. J. Gaines. These men and their wives were 
ready at every call. They gave suppers, fairs and 
picnics as well as other entertainments to raise money 
for the school. Not only would they help in the rais- 
ing of money, but they would come to the school and 
work for days without thinking of any pay for their 
work. When we got ready to put up a new building, 
we would have what we called a house-raising and 
would invite all the men in the neighborhood to come 
out and help us. On these days the wives of these 
men would compete with each other to see who could 
bring out the best basket. 

At the end of the first school year it was clearly 
seen that we needed two assistant teachers; but the 



38 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

question that puzzled us was, where could they work. 
"We had only one room and none of us had the money 
to buy the lumber needed. But there was a saw-mill 
near by and finally I sought work at this mill with the 
understanding that I would take my pay in lumber 
if the people would agree to feed me. This they read- 
ily consented to do. So I worked during May, June, 
July and August at the saw-mill and took my wages in 
lumber. This enabled us to get sufficient material to 
erect two of the rooms of our present Training Build- 
ing. The following October we opened school with 
three teachers and 150 students. These two teachers 
had graduated at Tuskegee with me in '93. They 
were Misses Ophelia Clopton and Rosa Bradford. 
They spent four years in the work here and we never 
had two teachers who did more for the old people in 
the community and who were loved more by them. 

In the fall of '95 Mr. Barnes, who was also a mem- 
ber of the class of '93, joined us, and has been con- 
nected with the school since then except for two years 
which he spent in Boston. 

In the fall of '98 another one of our class-mates, 
Julius Webster, a carpenter, joined in our work here. 
We now had five teachers, all of Tuskegee and all 
class-mates. I can never forget these old people and 
these early teachers, for we all shared our many sor- 
rows and our few joys. No work was too hard for us 
and no sacrifice was too great. 

Another Tuskegee student was with us almost from 
the beginning. While Mr. Rivers did not graduate 
from the Academic Department at Tuskegee, he fin- 
ished his trade, Agriculture, there. Mr. Rivers has 



IN THE BLACK BELT 39 

had charge of our farm off and on since '95. I should 
say to his credit that he is in charge today and last 
year he made the best crop the school has ever made. 

Thus far, I have spoken of the assistance given me 
by the colored people and teachers, but no chapter 
about the founding of Snow Hill Institute would be 
complete without a mention of Mr. R. 0. Simpson, the 
white man on whose plantation I was reared. Mr. 
Simpson must have known me from my birth. I well 
remember that in '78 and '79 he used to stop by to see 
my old grandmother when riding over his plantation. 
I think that my grandmother prepared meals for him 
on some of these visits to the plantation. I also re- 
member that after the death of grandmother, when 
I was sick and living with my aunt Rina, some days 
he would see me lying on the roadside and would toss 
me a coin. 

On my return from Tuskegee I found Mr. Simpson 
deeply interested in the welfare of my people ; in fact, 
it seemed as if he was looking for some one to start 
an industrial school upon his place. We had many 
talks together. When he found out that I had re- 
turned to cast my lot with my people, he seemed highly 
pleased and said that he would give a few acres for 
the school if I thought I could use it to advantage. I 
decided that this was my opportunity and told him 
that I could. He first gave seven acres, and then 
thirty-three, and finally sixty more, making in all one 
hundred acres that he gave the school. In later years 
we bought one-half of his plantation, making in all 
nearly two thousand acres. While all of the white 
people in Snow Hill have been friendly towards the 



40 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

work, I have found Mr. Simpson and his entire family 
to be our particular friends and I have yet to go to 
them for a favor and be refused. 

One of the cardinal points in Dr. Washington's 
Sunday evening talks to the students and teachers at 
Tuskegee was that they should buy homes of their 
own. I felt that the best way to teach the people to 
get a home was for me to own one myself. I thought 
that it would be useless for me to talk to them about 
buying homes as long as I did not have one for my- 
self, so I secured a home. 

After the school was thoroughly planted and I had 
bought and paid for my home, we began to encourage 
the people to buy homes. This was done through 
several agencies, the Negro Farmers Conference, the 
Workers Conference and the Black-Belt Improve- 
ment Society. The aim of this Society is clearly set 
forth in its constitution, a part of which is as follows : 

(1) This society shall be known as the Black Belt 
Improvement Society. Its object shall be the general 
uplift of the people of the Black Belt of Alabama; to 
make them better morally, mentally, spiritually, and 
financially. 

(2) It shall further be the object of the Black Belt 
Improvement Society as far as possible, to eliminate 
the credit system from our social fabric; to stimulate 
in all members the desire to raise, as far as possible, 
all their food supplies at home, and pay cash for what- 
ever may be purchased at the stores. 

(3) To bring about a system of co-operation in the 
purchase of what supplies cannot be raised at homo 
wherever it can be done to advantage. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 41 

(4) To discuss topics of interest to the communi- 
ties in which the various societies may be organized, 
and topics relating to the general welfare of the race, 
and especially to farmers. 

(5) To teach the people to practice the strictest 
economy, and especially to obtain and diffuse such 
information among farmers as shall lead to the im- 
provement and diversification of crops, in order to 
create in farmers a desire for homes and better home 
conditions, and to stimulate a love for labor in both 
old and young. Each local organization may offer 
small prizes for the cleanest and best-kept house, the 
best pea-patch, and the best ear of corn, etc. 

(6) To aid each other in sickness and in death; for 
this purpose a fee of ten cents will be collected from 
each member every month and held sacred to be used 
for no other purpose whatever. 

(7) It shall be one of the great objects of this so- 
ciety to stimulate its members to acquire homes, and 
urge those who already possess homes to improve and 
beautify them. 

(8) To urge our members to purchase only the 
things that are absolutely necessary. 

(9) To exert our every effort to obliterate those 
evils which tend to destroy our character and our 
homes, such as intemperance, gambling, ,and social 
impurity. 

(10) To refrain from spending money and time 
foolishly or in unprofitable ways; to take an interest 
in the care of our highways, in the paying of our taxes 
and the education of our children ; to plant shade trees, 
repair our yard fences, and in general, as far as pos- 



42 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

sible, bring our home life up to the highest standard 
of civilization. 

This Society has standing committees on Govern- 
ment, on Education, on Business, on Housekeeping, 
on Labor, and on Farming. The chairman of each of 
these committees holds monthly meetings in the va- 
rious communities, at which time various topics per- 
taining to the welfare and uplift of the people are dis- 
cussed. As a result of these meetings the people re- 
turn to their homes with new inspiration. The meet- 
ings are doing good in the communities where they are 
being held, and our sincere hope is that such meetings 
may be extended. It is the aim of the school and of 
its several organizations, to reach the ills that most 
retard the Negroes of the rural South. The articles 
of our simple constitution go to the very bottom of 
the conditions. 

Thus it will be seen that the work of the class-room 
is only a small part of what we are trying to do for 
the uplift of the Negro people in the Black Belt. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 43 



CHAPTER 8. 
Campaigning for Funds in the North. 

The matter of raising money for undenominational 
schools in the South is no easy task, and right here 
I ought to state just why I preferred to have such a 
school. Our people in the rural South are mostly 
Baptists and Methodists, and of course the denomi- 
nations have their schools, located in certain cities. 
While no one is barred from these schools, it is a fact 
that undue influence is exerted upon the pupils to 
make them become members of the church that sup- 
ports the school. This is not only true of the Metho- 
dist and Baptist schools, but is also true of all de- 
nominational schools in the South. I did not like that 
and our people do not like to have any one influence 
their children to join churches other than the one of 
their choice. We may shut our eyes to this truth, but 
the fact remains that Methodists do not want their 
children to be persuaded to join some other church, 
neither do the Baptists w^ant theirs taken away from 
them. 

Now, I wanted that my school should be free from 
such **isms. " I wanted a school for all the Negroes, 
thoroughly religious in its spirit, but entirely unde- 
nominational. For twenty-five years now we have ad- 
hered strictly to this policy. Many times when all 



44 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

was dark and there seemed to be no way, some of 
these denominations would come and offer me the 
money to run the work, provided I would accept their 
faith. But this I have never done, I had rather that 
the work should die than to sell my principle for 
money. I repeat that raising money for such a school 
is a hard task. I have never been particularly inter- 
ested as to the choice of the church that my students 
make, but I have been profoundly interested in their 
finding salvation. 

A great many people to whom I appeal for aid from 
time to time, tell me that they give all their alms 
through their church. But in spite of all this, I feel 
that the kind of schools most needed for our people, 
should be broad and not narrow, deep and not shallow. 

After winning the approval of the people in the 
community, both black and white, and getting what- 
ever help I could from them, my thoughts turned 
towards the North for means to run the work. My 
first attempt was in March, '97. I got as far as Wash- 
ington, D. C, and saw the Inauguration of President 
McKinley, and then I returned home. 

The following June Dr. Washington wrote me to 
come to Tuskegee so as to accompany the Tuskegee 
Quartet North that summer. It must not be under- 
stood that I was one of the singers; that was not mj^ 
good fortune. I was to tell what Tuskegee had done 
for me and was to show in turn what I was trying to 
do for my people. Dr. Washington reasoned in this 
way I would have a chance to meet some of the 
best people of the country and thereby gain support 
for my work. There was to be no collection taken foi 



IN THE BLACK BELT 45 

Snow Hill, but those who became interested would 
often come up after the meetings and give me some- 
thing for my work. 

We left Tuskegee about the first of July. We spent 
most of the month of July in the southeastern part 
of Massachusetts, known as the Cape and South Shore. 
We had meetings at most of the churches and resorts 
in that section. Dr. Washington himself met us at 
the most prominent places. 

In August we came to Boston and from there went 
up the North Shore. This was my first visit to Bos- 
ton and it was here that I met Miss Susan D. Mes- 
singer and her brother William S. Messinger. Their 
home was at 81 Walnut Avenue, Roxbury, Mass. 
Miss Messinger had been an abolitionist. Both she 
and her brother were deeply interested in the welfare 
of my people. They listened attentively to my story 
and from that day became my best friends. 

Although I have been going North now for twenty 
years, I have never met such welcome as was sho"«m 
me at their home. I think I have never met such 
Christ-like people anywhere. It was largely through 
Miss Messinger 's appeals in the ''Transcript" that 
the people of Boston and New England learned of our 
work at the Snow Hill Institute. Through her ap- 
peals from time to time, we raised much money for 
our school. I cannot, in words, express the valuable 
aid these people gave us in our work. Sometimes 
when I had worked hard all day with poor results, I 
would go to their home in the evening discouraged 
and low-spirited, but would always find there a hearty 
welcome and a word of cheer. I would always leave 



46 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

with new zeal and fresh courage. Their home has 
been to me a home now for twenty years and although 
they are now dead, I never go to Boston but that I j5nd 
time to go out to Mt. Auburn and put a fresh flower 
on their graves. The old home is lonely now, but the 
Messinger spirit still abides there in the person of 
Mr. Reed, their nephew. I still receive from him the 
hearty welcome and support that they used to give in 
days of old. 

Another friend whom I met that summer was Mrs. 
J. S. Howe of Brookline (now Mrs. Herman F. Vick- 
ery). She became interested in our work through 
Miss Messinger and from that time to this her inter- 
est has steadily grown. Had it not been for the en- 
couragement and aid received from the Messingers 
and Mrs. Howe on this trip, I am sure that I should 
have given up the struggle. 

After leaving Boston, the Tuskegee singers went up 
the North Shore and on to the Isles of Shoals. There 
we had a very good meeting, and as Mr. Washington 
could not be present, I was the principal speaker. 
The people were greatly interested in what I said and 
although we took up a good collection for Tuskegee, 
my private collection was equally large. This the 
leader of the quartet did not like. It was the duty of 
this man who was a teacher at Tuskegee, to speak as 
well as myself, but for some reason he did not like to 
do it and would always shirk it when he could. But 
after this meeting he cut off my support and when we 
reached Portsmouth, he told me that I was dividing 
the interest and that he could not use me further on 
that trip. Of course, what little money I had been 



IN THE BLACK BELT 47 

getting I had sent to the school, so I was ahnost pen- 
niless when he turned me off. I ought to say, how- 
ever, that he gave me my fare back to Boston. 
I reached Boston that night about eight o'clock with 
no money and nowhere to go, but finally, I went to the 
place where we had stopped when the quartet was in 
Boston and I found K. W. Taylor, who at the time 
was financial agent in the North for Tuskegee. He 
saw that I was discouraged and insisted that I tell him 
why I had come back to Boston. When he had learned 
the facts he told his landlady to provide lodging and 
board for me at his expense until I could do better. 

It was some time before Dr. Washington found out 
that I was not with the quartet, and as soon as he 
knew it, he wrote me to meet him at Lake Mohonk, 
N. Y. When the leader of the quartet found out that 
I was to be at Lake Mohonk, he tried to interfere so 
as to prohibit my going there, but when Dr. Washing- 
ton said a thing, it had to be done, and I went to Lake 
Mohonk and I met the quartet again; also Dr. Wash- 
ington. We had a great meeting at Lake Mohonk and 
after the meeting Mr. and Mrs. S. P. Avery, who were 
guests there, gave me $200. From here we returned 
South and reached Tuskeegee about the first of Sep- 
tember. From there I returned to Snow Hill. 

My trip North during the summer of '98 was very 
much saddened by the illness and death of my aunt 
Rina Rivers, whom I had learned to love as a mother, 
and to whom I alwaj^s feel that I owe my life, for 
had it not been for the care she gave me during 
my sickness, I could not have stood the ordeal. Her 
death came while I was in Boston and without suf- 



48 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

ficient funds to take me either to her bed-side or to 
her funeral. This incident in my life has always been 
a cause for deep sorrow and as the years go by I feel 
it more keenly. I had always hoped that she could 
have lived until I could make her life happy, but this 
pleasure has been forever denied me. However she 
left behind four daughters and many grandchildren 
and I have tried to be unusually kind to them because 
of my great love for their mother and grandmother. 
Again this was a hard year because of the Spanish 
War and the consequent excitement. 

I returned to Snow Hill early in the fall, cast down, 
but not destroyed. I had to adjust myself to the loss 
of my best earthly friend. In the meantime, our en- 
rollment was constantly increasing and new teachers 
and industries were being added from year to year. 

My campaign in the North during the summer of 
1899 was made alone, just as the previous one had 
been. I got much needed experience during this sum- 
mer. 

In this house-to-house campaign for money, one 
must expect many rebuffs, but on the other hand one 
meets some of the finest people that have ever lived. 
I find, however, that as I grow older the strain is 
harder. I don't think that I am a very successful 
money raiser. However, on April 5th, 1906, at the 
25th anniversary of Tuskegee, I delivered an address 
that interested Mr. Andrew Carnegie and he gave the 
Snow Hill Institute ten thousand dollars. (See Ap- 
pendix.) 



*7i ■««•'• 




H 

P 

EH 

>-( 

EH 
CO 

g 

K 

O 
to 

o 
> 



IN THE BLACK BELT 49 



CHAPTER 9. 

Results. 

In the preceding chapters I have tried in a plain and 
practical way to tell the story of my life and struggle 
for twentj^-five years. I now purpose to tell some re- 
sults of this effort. 

We started our work with no land, no building, and 
no assurance of any support from any source. In 
fact, we rented an old log cabin in which to begin our 
work. On the first day of opening, we had one 
teacher, three pupils and fifty cents in money, a pretty 
small capital with which to build a Normal and Indus- 
trial Institute. As I now look back on this early ad- 
venture of mine, I am amazed at the undertaking. 
Although penniless and almost without a place to rest 
my head, I had an abundance of hope and great faith 
in God. These have always been my greatest assets 
in this work. The people in the community were 
equally poor; not more than ten acres of land were 
owned by the colored people within a radius of ten 
miles, and there was even a mortgage on these ten 
acres. The homes of the people consisted chiefly of 
one-room and two-room log cabins. There was not a 
single glass window to be found. I remember that 
shortly after the founding of the school a Negro built 
a house and fitted it up with glass windows and peo- 
ple would go ten miles to see it. 



50 TWENTY-FIVE YEAKS 

The economic condition of the people was deplor- 
able. They all carried hea\y mortgages from year 
to year. These mortgages ranged all the way from 
$100 to $1500. The people were thoroughly discour- 
aged, and seemingly had lost all hopes. Everywhere 
in their religious services, they sang this song: "You 
may have all the world, but give me Jesus." The 
white man was taking them at their word and giving 
them all of Jesus, but none of the world. So dis- 
heartened were the people that when Mr. Simpson 
offered to give us the first seven acres of land for the 
school, many tried to prevail with him not to do so, 
saying that they did not want any land. But as I have 
said, you can always find in any place a few of our 
people whose hearts are in the right place; it was so 
in this instance ; a few of the old men were very stanch 
friends, — they stood by me in this fight and we won. 
Such was the condition of the people here twenty-five 
years ago. 

Now how changed are these conditions? From the 
rented log cabin the school has grown until we have 
at present, to be exact, 1940 acres of land and twenty- 
four buildings, counting large and small. It enrolls 
each year between three and four hundred students, 
teaches fourteen trades, putting most stress on agri- 
culture. The entire property is valued upwards of 
$125,000 and is deeded to a Board of Trustees. 

But the worth of an institution is not judged by 
houses and land, but by its ability to serve the people 
among whom it is located. It has never been our end 
to acquire houses, land and industries, these we have 
used as means of enabling us to accomplish our end, 



IN THE BLACK BELT 51 

which was and still is to seek and to save that which 
was lost. For twenty-five years then we have been 
here, seeking lost boys, lost girls, lost men and lost 
women. We have tolled our bells that they might 
hear, and preached the gospel of work in order that 
they might understand; we have used the church, the 
Sunday-School, Bible classes and other religious so- 
cieties that they might feel; the class-rooms that they 
might know; the shops and farms that they might 
handle and do. And so all of our material acquisi- 
tions have been used to drive home one great end; 
social service, better men and better women. 

Now how well we have accomplished this end may 
be seen from the following: Counting those who have 
finished the course of study and others who have re- 
mained at the school long enough to catch its spirit 
and be influenced by its teaching, we have sent out 
into various parts of the South more than a thousand 
young men and women who are today leading useful 
and helpful lives. They are farmers, blacksmiths, 
wheelwrights, carpenters, housekeepers, dressmakers, 
printers, railway postal clerks, letter carriers, teach- 
ers, preachers, domestic servants, insurance agents, 
doctors, expressmen, contractors, timber-inspectors, 
college students. In fact, they are to be found in 
every vocation known to the South. Many of these 
young people have bought farms and homes of their 
own, have erected neat and comfortable cottages ; have 
influenced their neighbors to buy land, to build better 
homes, better churches and better school-houses. 
They have also been instrumental in securing a higher 
type of teachers and preachers. They make a special 



52 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

effort always to cultivate a friendly relation between 
the two races. In this particular they have been re- 
markably successful. I shall speak more directly 
about their work under the chapter on Graduates. 

Perhaps I can in no way better show the effects of 
the school upon the immediate community than by 
referring to an address given by me and quoted in 
the appendix of this book. 

It is the custom at Tuskegee to have each class re- 
assemble at the school twenty years after graduation. 
Some one of the class is chosen by the school, to 
represent the class and is placed on the Commence- 
ment program. It fell my lot to represent my class on 
this occasion. 

Of course at the anniversary of each class, that 
class is expected to make a donation to the school. 
Although this had been the custom for several years, 
the class donations very seldom amounted to more 
than $100. Sometimes they were as small as $25.00 
or less. Somehow I have always felt that the gradu- 
ates of Tuskegee owed that institution a debt of grati- 
tude which they can never pay, and thought that they 
should make the class anniversaries mean something 
more substantial to the school than they had meant. 
So long before our time came, I wrote the members of 
my class telling them that it should be our aim to give 
Tuskegee $1000 at our Anniversary. They readily 
agreed with me and the class set itself to the task 
of raising the $1000. This was done because we felt 
that the time had come for the graduates to give more 
substantial aid to their Alma-Mater, and as a stimu- 
lus to those who are to follow. I think in a small way 



i 




m 

o 

« 

K 
H 



O 

n 
o 
111 

H 
« 



IN THE BLACK BELT 53 

it has served that purpose, because these class anni- 
versary donations have never been less than $500 
since that date. 

I think of all the talks I have ever made, none have 
given me the real joy that this one gave. I feel that 
this was true for the reason that this was a giving 
talk rather than a receiving one. The address is also 
given in the appendix. 



54 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 10. 
Origin of the Jeanes Fund. 

In the fall of 1902 I received a letter from Dr. 
Washington requesting me to speak at a meeting in 
Philadelphia in the interest of Tuskegee. Miss Cor- 
nelia Bowen, also a graduate of Tuskegee, was asked 
to speak at the same meeting. We both accepted. 
During my stay in the city Mr. Henry C. Davis, a 
trustee of Tuskegee at the time, gave me a letter of 
introduction to Miss Anna T. Jeanes, a wealthy 
woman who seldom gave to schools as large as Tus- 
kegee and Hampton, but who would, in all probability, 
be interested in my school. 

In going to Miss Jeanes 's home on Arch Street I had 
many apprehensions but I found her very cordial and 
deeply interested in the welfare of my people. I told 
her of my struggle to get an education and how, after 
finishing at Tuskegee I had returned to my home in 
Alabama. I described the condition of the public 
schools in the rural districts. She gave keen interest 
to this part of my story. Finally, she asked me if I 
was aiming to build a large school such as Tuskegee 
or Hampton. I told her that I had no such idea; that 
I only wanted to build a school that could properly 
care for three or four hundred students, and try as 
best I could to help the little schools throughout that 



IN THE BLACK BELT 55 

section. When I returned to Snow Hill I found a 
check from her for five thousand dollars for the work 
at Snow Hill. 

Each year after this Miss Jeanes gave me from 
$300 to $2000 for the work at Snow Hill. Finally, in 
the fall of 1906 when she had moved to the home in 
Germantown which she had established for the aged, 
I called to see her. She was then ill and although the 
nurse said that I could not see her, after my card had 
been taken to her, she sent for me. She was quite 
feeble, but said to me: *'I have been deeply interested 
in what thee has been telling me all these years about 
the little schools. I would give largely to them if thee 
thinks that thee could get Dr. Washington or Dr. Fris- 
sell to come to see me." I am sure she was thinking 
of the large experience of those men. She said also 
that she thought if she would make such a gift as she 
contemplated, it might induce other great philanthro- 
pists to do as much. 

At my suggestion Dr. Washington visited Miss 
Jeanes who gave $11,000 each to Dr. Washington and 
Dr. Frissell to be used as they thought best for the 
small schools. 

I am positive that the Jeanes Fund originated in 
this way, and I am proud of the part that I had in this 
affair and that so many Negro children can be helped 
by the fund that is destined to do so much for the ele- 
vation of our people in this country. 



56 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 11. 

Appreciation. 

In building up an institution such as we have done 
at Snow Hill, no one man is entitled to all the credit. 
On the contrary, it is impossible to name all to whom 
credit is due. We can only speak of those who have 
been closely allied with us and whose work has been 
prominent in the building of the institution. Perhaps 
of these, the Trustees come first. We could never 
have gone on with the work from year to year without 
their aid and assistance. 

Without Mr. R. 0. Simpson there could not have 
been any Snow Hill Institute. We might have built 
a similar school elsewhere, but we could not have built 
it at Snow Hill. Mr. Simpson gave the first site for 
the school and from the start has been one of our best 
friends. He stood for Negro Education when it was 
unpopular for him to do so. He allied himself with 
this cause, at the risk of being ostracised by other 
white people. Because of his firm stand, most of the 
white people in this section have been won over to 
his way of thinking, and now there is scarcely if any 
opposition hereabouts to the Snow Hill Institute. 

Mr. R. 0. Simpson is one of the noblest men that I 
have ever met, North or South. He is absolutely free 
from all racial and petty prejudice that we so often 



IN THE BLACK BELT 57 

find in the average man of today. I feel safe in say- 
ing that he is living at least fifty years ahead of his 
time. The things that he stands for and have been 
fighting for, for thirty years, are coming more and 
more to pass, and although it seems hard for the pres- 
ent generation to accept them, they must be accepted 
if we would make the world safe for Democracy. He 
is a true patriot, a true democrat, and a zealous Chris- 
tian gentleman. Mr. Simpson has a family of five 
children, three sons and two daughters, all of whom 
possess his spirit to a large degree. 

I first met Rev. R. C. Bedford at Tuskegee while I 
was there in school. I loved him from the first time 
I saw him and I feel that this was because of his deep 
and sincere interest in our people. Until I met Mr. 
Bedford, I had always distrusted the white man and 
thought it was impossible for any white man to be 
free from race prejudice. After my graduation at 
Tuskegee, as I said before, I returned to Snow Hill 
and seeing that Mr. Bedford and Mr. Simpson had 
something in common, arranged to have Mr. Bedford 
come to Snow Hill and meet Mr. Simpson. Their 
meeting resembled that of Jonathan and David, and I 
believe their friendship was equally great. It contin- 
ued until Mr. Bedford's death. Mr. Bedford was one 
man who understood what it was to build up an in- 
stitution from nothing. He knew the hardships one 
had to undergo to meet bills when there was no money 
appropriated for these bills. He knew what it was 
to make brick without straw. Ofttimes when the bur- 
den was heavy and the yoke rough, it was the encour- 
aging words from Mr. Bedford that gave me strength 



58 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

and courage to continue. While his particular mis- 
sion was to look after the Tuskegee schools, he loved 
every good work and would always lend a hand to a 
good cause. He was thoroughly imbued with the 
Christ-spirit. 

I cannot express in words the great debt of grati- 
tude that I owe the immortal Booker T. Washington, 
for I owe all to him. It was he who changed my view 
of life. He changed me from the visionary to the sub- 
stantial, from the shadow to the substance, from the 
artificial to the real, and from words to deeds. Dr. 
Washington became a trustee of Snow Hill Institute 
from its beginning and remained as such until his 
death. He made three visits to Snow Hill, the last 
being November 18th, 1914. Dr. Washington always 
did what he could to help us in our work. He seemed 
to appreciate the efforts that we were putting forth to 
uplift our people. He could sympathize with us; he 
could understand that an institution that had no per- 
manent support, but had to depend upon the efforts of 
one man to raise money, could not be perfect, and 
many things were not as well as they should be. Dr. 
Washington could sympathize with us because he 
knew what it was. He had borne the burden in the 
heat of the day. But I find that persons who have 
done nothing themselves, but have lived as parasites 
most of their days, are much more critical than Dr. 
Washington ever could be. Sometimes I am asked to 
what I attribute Dr. Washington's success in life. My 
answer to this question has always been the same: to 
his spirit and simplicity. He possessed in a very large 
degree, the spirit and simplicity of the Master. He 



IN THE BLACK BELT 59 

never struck back. He always sought to do good to 
those who would do evil to him. He was meek and 
lowly of heart, and I know that he has found rest for 
his soul. 

There are other trustees who have played a promi- 
nent part in the development of the work here, among 
whom may be mentioned Mr. James H. Post, Rev. 
Henry Wilder Foote, Prof. "William Howell Reed and 
Mr. William H. Baldwin, 3rd. The trustees are now 
taking a more active part in the work than ever be- 
fore. This is their bounden duty, because the school 
is theirs, not mine. 

Next to the Trustees, the officers and teachers have 
played a prominent part in the work here. My class- 
mate, Henry A. Barnes, has been treasurer of the 
school for twenty-three years, which period of ser- 
vice is, in itself, a tribute to his faithfulness. Mr. 
Barnes not only does the work of treasurer, but is also 
Acting Principal during my absence from the school, 
and under him the work of the school continues with 
little or no interruption while I am away. What Mr. 
Barnes has been to the Financial Department, Mr. 
R. A. Daly has been to our Industries. I consider Mr. 
Daly the best Industrial man that we can have. 

The Academic Department has been developed un- 
der the management of Messrs. Whitehead and Handy, 
and it stands well in comparison with that of other 
similar schools in the State. 

I cannot overestimate the value of the conscientious 
work done by my secretaries during all these years. 
Miss Rebecca Savage (now Mrs. R. V. Cooke) served 
in this capacity for fourteen years and Miss 0. H. 



60 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

Williamson has served one way or another for five 
years. Much of the office work and responsibility 
fall upon the secretaries and this responsibility they 
have borne without complaint. Sometimes we have 
been compelled to work night and day, but they have 
always been willing to serve. Not only have the offi- 
cers been willing to serve, but the rank and file of our 
teachers have showTi the same spirit of willingness 
from year to year. Sometimes they would get their 
pay promptly and at other times they would have to 
wait for months, but always they have been willing to 
do what they could to cheer and help me in the dark- 
est hour of the struggle. I believe that the spirit of 
the officers and teachers of Snow Hill Institute is: 
*'Not to be ministered unto, but to minister." 

Aside from Trustees, officers and teachers, there is 
that great cloud of witnesses which no man can num- 
ber, who have helped by their aid, their words of 
cheer and their presence from time to time. These 
are in all parts of the country, but principally in the 
North and East. How shall we thank them for what 
they have been to us? We cannot do it by words, be- 
cause there are no words that could adequately ex- 
press our deep sense of gratitude to this host of 
friends. We must, therefore, be contented to show 
them by our acts and deeds that we are ever mindful 
of their help and that each day we are striving more 
and more to make ourselves and our work worthy of 
their aid and encouragement. Among this cloud of 
witnesses are some of the best people that God has 
ever made. They deem it a privilege to give and to 
help the lowly. 



ii 




TYPICAL LOG CABIN IX THE BLACK BELT 




HOME OF A SNOW HILL GRADUATE 



IN THE BLACK BELT 61 

In speaking of our debt of gratitude to the forces 
that have helped in building up our work here, we 
must not overlook the press. There are certain great 
papers in this country that have been fearless in their 
advocacy of right and justice to the Negro, and have 
always opened their columns to any cause that has for 
its end the uplift of the lowly. Ainong these may be 
mentioned especially The New York Evening Post, 
The Boston Transcript, The Springfield Republican, 
The Hartford Courant, and in the South The Mont- 
gomery Advertiser. 

One also receives much aid and encouragement from 
those who are in similar work. It has been my good 
fortune to meet in the North from time to time with 
those who have similar work as mine. In this way I 
have met most of the Principals of Southern Schools. 
Perhaps Mr. W. H. Holtzclaw of Utica, Mississippi, 
comes first in this class. This is true, because I have 
known him the longest. I first met him in Tuskegee 
in the early nineties, when we both were in school 
there. His life was similar to mine, as we both had 
a very hard time in trying to get an education. I be- 
came interested in him there and when he finished I 
took him to work with me at Snow Hill. It was at 
Snow Hill that he met and married Miss Mary Ella 
Patterson, one of our teachers. They remained with 
us at Snow Hill four years. Both Mr and Mrs. Holtz- 
claw have always seemed more like my relatives 
than like friends. Some of Mr. Holtzclaw 's best teach- 
ers today are graduates of Snow Hill Institute. I 
have always been deeply interested in the welfare of 
Utica for it is in reality an outgrowth of Snow Hill. 



62 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

Other Principals whom I meet occasionally, are 
President Battle of Okolona, Mississippi, where a 
nmnber of our graduates have worked. I have found 
Mr. Battle interested in the general cause of Negro 
Education, and too, we found in our case that the 
cause is the same. I have had occasion to ask Mr. 
Battle just how our graduates measure up with his 
other teachers, and he tells me that Snow Hill gradu- 
ates are among his best helpers. By this I know 
that in deeds, not words, we are making good. 

Another most interesting character whom I always 
meet on my tours North is Mr. Frank P. Chisholm, 
Financial Secretary of Tuskegee Institute. I have been 
knowing Mr. Chisholm for a great many years. "We 
have attended the Summer School at Harvard several 
summers together and it has been both a pleasure and 
benefit to me to be associated with him in this way. Al- 
though working directly for Tuskegee, he has always 
been willing to speak a word for Snow Hill wherever 
the opportunity presented itself. I have obtained 
many suggestions from Mr. Chisholm which have been 
very beneficial to me in my work here. I consider Mr. 
Chisholm a representative type of the new Negro of 
to-day. He is a brilliant scholar, a clear thinker, and is 
doing a very effective work for Tuskegee. 

Others with whom I come in contact on such trips 
are Principal Hunt of Fort Valley, Ga. ; Principal Min- 
afee of Denmark, S. C. ; Principal Long of Christian- 
burg, Va. These young men and many others are do- 
ing a greater work than they know, and all possess in 
a smaller or larger degree the spirit of dear old Tus- 
kegee. They are all preaching the gospel of Service. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 63 



CHAPTER 12. 
Graduates and Ex-students. 

Prof. Bagley in his ** Classroom Management," 
page 225, has the following to say in "Testing Re- 
sults ' ' : 

"The nltimate test of efficiency of efforts is the re- 
sult of effort. Unhappily this test is seldom applied 
to the work of teaching. We judge the teacher by the 
process rather than by the product, and we introduce 
a number of extraneous criteria to hide the absence 
of a real criterion. We watch the way in which he 
conducts a recitation, how many slips he makes 
in his diction and syntax, inspect his personal appear- 
ance, ask of what school he is a graduate and how 
many degrees he possesses, inquire into his moral 
character, determine his church membership, and 
judge him to be a good or a poor teacher according 
to our findings. All of these queries may have their 
place in the estimation of any teacher's worth, but 
they do not strike the most salient, the most vital, 
point at issue. That point is simply this: Does he 
'make good' in results? Does he do the thing that he 
sets out to do, and does he do it well?" 

I agree wholly with Prof. Bagley in this particular 
and on these grounds we are willing to stand or fall 
by the results of our graduates. 

Speaking of our graduates and ex-students, I wish 



64 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

to point to the life and work of a few written by their 
own hands because in these particular cases I can 
testify to the truth of every word they say, having 
known them from early childhood. Their record fol- 
lows and they speak for themselves : 

*'I was born in Snow Hill, Wilcox County, Alabama, 
about 30 years ago. I was the 14th child of a family 
of 17. My father was a very prosperous farmer and 
believed in educating his children. Each year ho 
would send them by twos off to schools, such as Talla- 
dega, Tuskegee and Normal, Alabama. Some of the 
older children, however, did not take advantage of 
the great opportunity they had. He spent his money 
lavishly on them and about the time I was large 
enough to go off to school, he was not as prosperous. 
As soon as I was old enough he kept me in the public 
and sometimes private schools, both summer and win- 
ter. Yet, he had promised to send the remainder of 
us off to school. Fortunately for us, however. Snow 
Hill Institute had been established by Mr. W. J. Ed- 
wards, and my father being very much impressed with 
Mr. Edwards and his teachers, consulted him about 
entering three children, I being the youngest. Mr. 
Edwards kindly consented and we were at once put in 
school there. I was also fond of music and after 
learning that Snow Hill Institute had such an efficient 
music teacher, I was very much pleased to attend 
school there. So in the year of 1900 I entered. I was 
enabled to develop my musical talent to the extent 
that I was selected to play for my home church, and 
that inspired other students to attend Snow Hill In- 
stitute. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 65 

"During my first year in school there I was unde- 
cided as to just what I was going to follow as a trade. 
I worked awhile in the sewing room then in the laun- 
dry — was also interested in cooking and took special 
lessons in cooking under Miss Mabry. In fact, I 
studied cooking the first two years. Finally, in my 
senior year, Miss C. V. Johnson, then Secretary to 
Mr. Edwards, asked me to clean the offices of morn- 
ings for her and work with her on my work days. I 
began this work and would watch her using the type- 
writer so much until I fully decided that I wanted to 
make an efficient secretary for someone, and began 
working to that end. On my work days she would 
have me copying letters with ink. I would be careful 
not to make a mistake. During the time I was work- 
ing in the office, Mr. Edwards would often send me on 
errands and tell me to see how quickly I could go and 
come. He seemed to have been very much impressed 
with my work as a student in both the Academic and 
Industrial departments. There were several prize 
contests given my class by different teachers, and I 
won each prize. This was in the Academic depart- 
ment. There were twelve members in the class. Mr. 
Edwards had the members of my class to write some 
friends of the school for scholarships (this being the 
request of the friends) and of the two persons that 
received favorable answers, I was one. During the 
whole time I was in school I did not receive one de- 
merit, or a black mark. Our teachers seemed perfect, 
and it was a pleasure for me to try to please them. 

'*In the year 1903 I graduated from the institution 
with a splendid grasp of all that the school stood for 



66 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

and in favor with all of my teachers and friends. Mr. 
Edwards, knowing my ability to do things as I was 
instructed, employed me to work in his office as clerk. 
I then put forth more strenuous efforts to do efficient 
work and would try to improve myself along that par- 
ticular line of work. So in the summer of 1905 I at- 
tended school at Cheyney, Pa., taking a special course 
in English, typewriting and shorthand. I did my best 
to give satisfaction in my work. 

"In the year 1909 I was made Private Secretary to 
Mr. Edwards and a member of the Executive Council. 
I still had a desire to make further improvement, and 
in the summer of 1911, I attended Comer's Commer- 
cial College in Boston, Mass., trying to become more 
efficient in the work that was assigned to my hands. 
Principal Edwards would have to be away from the 
school most of the time soliciting means to carry on 
the work, but I tried to not leave a stone unturned in 
accomplishing the work he left behind. Snow Hill In- 
stitute succeeded in inculcating into my life a love for 
work, and I am not satisfied unless I have some work 
to do. 

**I worked for Mr. Edwards untiringly until Octo- 
ber, 1917. I was married, however, in July, 1917. I 
have often wondered where my lot would have been 
cast had there been no Snow Hill Institute." 

**I was bom of ex-slave parents on the Calhoun 
plantation in Dallas County, Alabama. I am not 
quite sure of the exact date of my birth, but at any 
rate, as nearly as I have been able to learn, I was born 
near the village called Kichmond, in the month of 
May, 1883. My life had its beginning under the most 



IN THE BLACK BELT 67 

difficult circumstances. This was so, however, not be- 
cause of any wilful neglect on the part of my parents, 
but as ex-slaves they naturally knew but little as to 
the providing for the maintenance of their family and 
home. I was born in a one-room log cabin about 
14x15 feet square. In this cabin I lived with my 
mother, father and the other eight sisters and broth- 
ers until providentially I found an opportunity to 
enter school at Snow Hill Institute, Snow Hill, Ala- 
bama. 

*'I went to Snow Hill in the year of 1896, and there 
remained for eight years receiving instruction at the 
hand of a loyal band of self-sacrificing teachers, who 
not only taught me how to read, write and to cipher, 
but in addition they taught me lessons of thrift and in- 
dustry which have proven to be the main saving point 
in my life. 

*'I completed the prescribed course of study at the 
Snow Hill Institute in 1904 and returned home as I 
had resolved to do, before entering school there, for 
the purpose of helping the people of my home com- 
munity. 

''The Street Manual Training School (Incorpo- 
rated) at Eichmond, Dallas Coimty, Alabama, was 
started in 1904 with one teacher, fifteen pupils and no 
money. Since that time it has grown to the point 
where it now has thirty acres of land, four buildings, 
and an enrollment of three hundred pupils. The en- 
tire property is valued at fifteen thousand dollars 
($15,000) and deeded to a board of Trustees. Among 
the members of this board are: Mr. J. D. Alison, Pres- 
ident, Mrs. Edwin D. Mead, the Rev. Mr. Emmanuel M. 



68 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

Brown, Mr. Wm. D. Brigham, Mr. Walter Powers, 
Mr. Edwin W. Lambert, Mr. W. J. Edwards, Mrs. 
Francis Carr and Mr. Henry A. Barnes. 

'*This school is training some three hundred Negro 
children between the ages of six and eighteen years 
in the practical arts necessary to enable them to make 
an earnest, comfortable living. There is no attempt 
made to teach them foreign languages, either dead or 
living; but they are well grounded in the English lan- 
guage. They do not study higher mathematics, but 
they learn simple arithmetic. They spend no time on 
psychology, economics, sociology, or logic; their time 
is taken up trying to raise crops, to manage a small 
farm, to cook and to sew.'* 

Sketch of My Life. 

"I was born in Snow Hill, Wilcox County, Alabama, 
December 24th, 1883. My parents were Emanuel and 
Emma McDufiQe. I was brought up under the most 
adverse conditions. My father died about six months 
before my birth, thus leaving my mother with the care 
of seven children. As I had never seen my father, I 
was often referred to by the other children of the 
community, as the son of ''none." In July, 1893, my 
mother died and the burden of caring for the children 
then fell upon my old grandmother, who was known 
throughout the community as *'Aunt" Polly. In order 
to help secure food and clothing for myself and the 
rest of the family, I was compelled to plow an ox on 
a farm and as we usually made from four to five bales 
of cotton and 40 and 50 bushels of corn each year, she 



IN THE BLACK BELT 69 

was looked upon as a great farmer. When I was 
fifteen years of age, my grandmother was called to 
her heavenly rest, thus leaving a house full of chil- 
dren to shift for themselves. After her death I be- 
came interested in education and immediately applied 
for admittance to Snow Hill Normal and Industrial 
Institute, which had recentlv been established. I was 
admitted as a w^ork student, working all day and at- 
tending school about two hours and a half at night. 
Until I entered Snow Hill Institute, I had a very 
vague idea about life as it pertained to the Negro. 
In fact, up until that time, I was of the opinion that 
the Negro had no business being anything; but after 
entering the school and being surrounded by a differ- 
ent atmosphere and seeing what had already been ac- 
complished by Mr. Edwards, I soon realized that the 
Negro had as much right to life and liberty as any 
other man. 

''While it was great joy for me to be in school, I 
was woefully unprepared to remain there. Really, I 
am unable to tell the many obstacles that confronted 
me while in school. But one of my many difficulties 
was to get sufficient clothing, for when I entered, I 
had on all that I possessed and day after day I wore 
what I had until finally they got beyond mending. 
The teachers at Snow Hill were just as they are now, 
extremely hard against dirt and filth. As I only had 
one suit of underwear and as we were compelled to 
change at least once a week, I could plainly see that 
my condition was becoming more alarming each day. 
So I would go down to the spring at night, wash that 
suit and dry it the best I could by the heater that was 



70 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

in my room. Quite often I would go for days wearing 
damp or wet underwear, which has caused both 
pain and doctor bills in after years. Finally, Mr. 
Edwards relieved me of this situation when he sent 
me to the sales-room to get a pair of second-hand 
trousers and another suit of underwear. My trousers 
didn't begin to fit, for they were both too large and 
too long, but I wore them with pleasure because I 
went to Snow Hill in search of an education and I was 
willing to make any sacrifice to obtain my desire. 
Through all of my troubles I never became discour- 
aged, because I felt that some day I would be pre- 
pared to be of service to my people. 

*'0f all things that gave me inspiration while in 
school, Mr. Edwards's own Christian life which he 
lived before us day after day had more to do with 
keeping me there than anything else. His courage and 
perseverance under difficulties, which we all could see, 
were noble lessons to me. In his Sunday evening talks 
in the chapel, he would plead with us to shape our 
lives for work among those who were less fortunate 
than we. One Sunday evening, he made a powerful 
and vivid appeal, admonishing the students to go out, 
when they had finished their education, and start their 
life 's work among the lowly in the rural districts. He 
spoke these words many times during the term. In 
fact, so often did he repeat them that the very 
thoughts of them inspired me and I soon learned to 
love the cause of humanity as well and as dearly as 
did Mr. Edwards himself. Soon after completing my 
course in May, 1904, a call came from the Black Belt 
of North Carolina for a man to go to Laurinburg and 



IN THE BLACK BELT 71 

build np an Industrial school there. After talking 
the matter over with Mr. Edwards, I decided to go. 

**I reached the town of Laurinburg September 15, 
1904. When I got there I found that the people had 
been so often deceived and hoodwinked by political 
demagogues and supposed race leaders, that they had 
no confidence in any one. But I made a start and 
opened school in an old public school building with 
seven students and fifteen cents in cash. As the peo- 
ple had no confidence in me, it was hard for me to in- 
crease my enrollment, but I continued to labor with 
them on the streets and in the churches until I gradu- 
ally won their respect. Then we started the erection 
of a new school building and from that day until now, 
both white and black have taken the deepest interest 
in the work and we now have the absolute confidence 
of all the people. 

**The work has constantly gro^\Ti from year to year 
and results have been obtained. From one teacher, 
seven students and fifteen cents in cash, thirteen years 
ago, the institution now has fourteen teachers, up- 
wards of four hundred students from all over North 
Carolina, Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia, and 
counting land, livestock, five large and three small 
buildings, it has a property valuation of $30,000 all 
free of debt. Each year our teachers are selected 
from some of the best schools of the South; such as 
Tuskegee Institute, Shaw University, Snow Hill In- 
stitute, Claflin University, Benedict College, etc. 
Eight industries are taught, consisting of farming, 
blacksmithing, wheelwrighting, sewing, laundering, 
printing, domestic science and home nursing. 



72 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

''We are kept in immediate need of money for cur- 
rent and building expenses, but we are going on ac- 
complishing results with what we have at hand. Boys 
and girls are being sent out each year to work among 
their fellows. These young men and women are reach- 
ing the masses and as a result, the moral tone of the 
people is being aroused to the contemplation of higher 
ideals and they are at last becoming serious as to the 
sober side of life. Excursions, parties and a good time 
generally are slowly but surely being relegated to the 
rear. Our farmers are studying how to become better 
farmers and in all walks of life, we are improving in 
workshop and the various industries. 

"Verily, the school room is doing much in awaken- 
ing the dormant energies of the Negro for good. In 
fact, the school's influence is helping the people gen- 
erally. Where there were ignorance and indifference, 
now we have a fair measure of intelligence and thrift. 
The people are buying homes and property, and in 
many ways showing signs of aspiration. 

"We have also organized a farmers' conference and 
it is gratifying indeed to see how hundreds of farmers, 
with their wives and children, turn out seeking in- 
formation, demonstration and co-operation. I have 
been thus enabled to help my people here in North 
Carolina by giving them the new truth and the new 
light and pointing them on to a better way." 

Waverley Turner Carmichael was born at Snow- 
Hill, Ala., in 1888, and was reared on the farm as all 
country negro boys are. All of his education was ob- 
tained at the Snow Hill Institute except for six weeks 
he spent in the Harvard Summer School last year. 




GRADUATES OF SNOW HILL INSTITUTE 



Emmanuel McDuffie, Principal I.aurin- 
biirff Normal and Industrial Institute, 
Laurinburs. N. C. 

John W. Brister. who established a prize 
at Snow Hill Institute. 



Rfv. Emmanuel M.Brown of Street Manual 
Training School, Richmond, Alabama. 

Waverley Turner Carmichael, Poet of 
Snow Hill. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 73 

I had been deeply impressed with the poems which 
he had been writing for several years, but as I was no 
judge of poems, I thought I would give him a chance 
to bring his poems before those who could judge, so 
I received for him a free scholarship at the Summer 
School at Harvard. He read his poems to the class on 
several occasions and I had the opportunity of hear- 
ing him several times. They had a deep impression 
upon the class, so much so that his professor wrote the 
introduction to his book in the following words : — 

*'When Waverley Carmichael, as a student in my 
summer class at Harvard, brought me one day a mod- 
est sheaf of his poems, I felt that in him a race had be- 
come or at least was becoming articulate. We have 
had, it is true, sympathetic portrayals of Negro life 
and feeling from without ; we have had also the poems 
of Dunbar, significant of the high capabilities of the 
Negro as he advances far along the way of civilization 
and culture. The note which is sounded in this little 
volume is of another sort. These humble and often 
imperfect utterances have sprung up spontaneously 
from the soul of a primitive and untutored folk. The 
rich emotion, the individual humor, the simple wis- 
dom, the naive faith which are its birthright, have 
here for the first time found voice. It is sufficient to 
say of Waverley Carmichael that he is a full blooded 
southern Negro, that until last summer he has never 
been away from his native Alabama, that he has had 
but the most limited advantages of education, and 
that he has shared the portion of his race in hardship, 
poverty and toil. He does not know why he wrote 
these poems. It is an amazing thing that he should 



74 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

have done so — a freak, we may call it, of the wind of 
genius, which bloweth where it listeth and singles out 
one in ten thousand to find a fitting speech for the 
dumb thought and. feeling of the rest. 

But we need not base the claim of Carmichael to 
the attention of the public merely on considerations of 
this sort. His work speaks for itself. It is original 
and sincere. It follows no traditions and suffers no 
affectation. It is artless, yet it reaches the goal of 
art. The rhythms, especially of some of the religious 
pieces, are of a kind which is beyond the reach of ef- 
fort. He has rightly called them melodies. Occasion- 
ally there is, it seems to me, a touch of something 
higher, as in the haunting refrain of the lyric "Win- 
ter is Coming. ' ' 

De yaller leafs are falling fas' 
Fur summer days is been and pas* 
The air is blowin' mighty cold, 
Like it done in days of old. 

But this is rare. Oftenest the characteristic note is 
humor, or tender melancholy relieved by a philosophy 
of cheer and courage, and the poetic virtue is that of 
simple truth. We are reminded of no poet so strongly 
as of Burns. 

What Waverley Carmichael may accomplish in the 
future I do not know. But certainly in this volume 
he has entitled himself to the gratitude of his own 
race and to the sympathetic appreciation of all who 
have its interests and those of true poetry at heart." 

JAMES HOLLY HANFORD. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 75 

Mr. William Stanley Braithwaite speaking of his 
poems had the following to say : 

''Many have claimed the mantle of Paul Laurence 
Dunbar, but only upon the shoulders of Waverley 
Turner Carmichael has it fallen, and he wears it with 
becoming grace and fitness. For this poet, a veritable 
child of Negro folk, gives expression to its spirit in 
need and language more akin to the ante-bellum 'spir- 
itueP than any writer I know. Like those 'black and 
unknown bards' he sings because he must, with all 
their fervid imaginativeness, symbolizations, poignant 
strains of pathos and philosophic humor." 

Mr. Braithwaite is the best known Negro critic of 
poetry in the world today. 

As for me who has always lived in the South and 
know the Southern Negro through and through, I feel 
and believe that Carmichael has interpreted Negro 
life as never before. 

We hope and pray that Carmichael will live through 
this great ordeal and come back to us and continue his 
work of interpreting Negro life. 

There are hundreds of other graduates and ex-stu- 
dents who have won distinction in other fields and are 
doing equally as well as those who have been men- 
tioned here. We have their record at the school, and 
any one can have them for the asking. I only wish to 
mention in a brief way two other graduates because 
they have established a first and second prize at Snow 
Hill. They are John W. Brister and Edmond J. 
O'Neal. 

Several years ago the late Misses Collins (Ellen and 
Marguerite) of New York, two of the most sainted 



76 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

women whom I ever met, established an annual prize 
at the school known as the Sumner Peace Prize, of 
$15.00. But at their death this prize would have 
stopped unless some one had taken it up. Both Mr. 
Brister and Mr. O'Neal had won these prizes several 
times while thev were in school. So at the death of 
the Misses Collins they came forward and said that 
they would be responsible for the prize each year on 
condition that the school make a first and second prize 
instead of one, Mr. Brister giving $10.00 in gold for 
the first prize and Mr. 'Neal giving $5.00 in gold for 
the second. This they have done for several years, 
and they constantly assure me that it will be kept up 
during their lifetime. This shows that our graduates 
are carrying with them the spirit of Christ, "Freely 
receive, freely give." 



ji 



IN THE BLACK BELT 77 



CHAPTER 13. 
The Solution of the Negko Problem. 

All prophecies pertaining thus far to the solution 
of the Negro Problem have failed. Men in all parts 
of the country are becoming alarmed over the situa- 
tion and are asking, ''whither are we drifting?" And 
yet although everyone admits that there is a Negro 
problem, few are agreed as to the exact nature of the 
problem, and still fewer are agreed as to what the 
final answer should be. 

Generally speaking, the Negro problem consists of 
twelve millions of people of African descent living in 
this country, mostly in the Southern states, and form- 
ing one-third of the population of this section and one- 
eighth of the entire population of the United States. 
Notwithstanding the fact that we are far from an 
agreement as to the answer to this problem, we are 
all agreed that the solution must be sought in the an- 
swers to the following questions: What is to be the 
economic, the political, the civil, and the social status 
of the Negro in this country? 

It is true that there are criminals in the Negro race 
for whom no legal form of punishment is too severe. 
It is also true that the better and best classes of Ne- 
groes are daily being insulted in the streets, on the 
street-cars, on the railroads, at the ticket offices, at the 



78 



TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



baggage rooms, the express offices, and in fact, in all 
places pertaining to public travel. They are perse- 
cuted, despised, rejected, and discriminated against 
before every court in the South. Since the Negro is 
now being lynched as readily for his sins of omission 
as he is for his sins of commission, it is quite neces- 
sary for him when traveling in the South, to keep con- 
stantly in telegraphic communication with the agent 
at the station ahead as to the movement of the mob. 
In addition to this, the Negro is subjected to many 
other forms of persecution and discrimination in al- 
most every walk of life. These things go to make up 
what we call the Negro problem. 

The White Man's Solution. 

A large majority of the white men in the South be- 
lieve that this problem is to be solved by the Negro 
"learning his place" and keeping in it. Though they 
do not say just what this place is, they purpose to 
teach it to the Negro by disfranchisement, by limiting 
his education, by discrimination on the streets and on 
the railroads, by barring him from public parks, pub- 
lic libraries, and public amusements of any kind, by 
insulting replies to courteous questions, by conviction 
for trivial offences, and, finally, by judge lynch and 
the shot gun. This class is called the rabble. 

There is another class of white men in the South, 
though fewer in number, who deprecate all such views 
and actions (as advanced by this first class). They 
believe that the Negro should have equal legal rights, 
but that he should be denied equal political and educa- 



jj 



IN THE BLACK BELT 79 

tional rights. They believe the Bible to be the panacea 
for all the ills of the Negro. To bear out their conten- 
tion, they often revert to the time when, they say, 
there was no race problem. This, they say, was dur- 
ing slavery, when the master taught his slaves the 
beneficent influence of the Holy Bible. They are now 
appealing to the white men of the South to return to 
this practice. In this class would fall a large number 
of politicians, statesmen, educators, and ministers. 
This is called the conservative class. 

There is still a third class of white men in the 
South, who believe that the Negro is a man, nothing 
more and nothing less. They believe that under simi- 
lar circumstances the Negro will act as other races 
do. They contend that the Negro should have equal 
rights in every respect; they believe that worthy Ne- 
groes like worthy white men, should vote, and that 
ignorant and vicious Negroes like ignorant and vicious 
white men, should not; that the school money should 
be divided equally among the children of the state re- 
gardless of race, color or previous conditions; that 
the Negro should be given justice in all of the courts ; 
that the criminal and lawless Negro, like the criminal 
and lawless white man, should be punished to the full 
extent of the law. They believe that a strict adher- 
ence to this view will result in the final solution of the 
problem. There are, however, so few who feel in this 
way, and they are so widely scattered, that they can 
hardly be called a class. The other classes of white 
people consider them insane and accuse them of ad- 
vocating social equality. They are given no voice in 
the government and their wishes are disregarded as 



80 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

readily as those of the Negro. They are sometimes 
persecuted, ostracised, and harmed in every conceiv- 
able way. This class is increasing and the two other 
classes decreasing. 

The Negro's Method of Solution. 

There are three classes of Negroes in the South, but 
only one desires a solution of the problem and that is 
class number two, of those I shall mention. Class 
number one is composed chiefly of the illiterate and 
superstitious Negroes. They usually work on the 
railroads, on the steamboats, in the large saw-mills, 
and on the farms for wages. They have no homes and 
do not want any; but float from place to place. This 
class is contented to be let alone, but is quick to resent 
an insult, and will shoot almost as readily as the white 
man, and make no attempt to choose their victims. 
Among this class are to be found the whiskey seller, the 
drunkard, the gambler, and the criminal of the lowest 
type. It is the low, degraded and depraved criminals 
of this class who stir up and incite race hatred, which 
always results in race riots. They do not attend 
church or any other religious meeting. The better 
class of Negroes are as anxious to get rid of these as 
the white man. 

The second class is composed of the renters of 
farms, the owners of farms, of homes, of preachers, 
teachers, students, professional and business men. 
They believe that the Negro should be educated in the 
trades as well as in the professions; that they should 
own homes, pay their taxes and perform their civic du- 



IN THE BLACK BELT 81 

ties like all other citizens and that they should possess 
all of the rights and privileges that are delegated to 
them by the Constitution of the United States. They 
believe in the purity of the state and in the sanctity of 
the home. They are enduring, self-sacrificing, pa- 
tient, and long suffering, and desire the good of all. 
It is this class that always assists in quelling race riots 
and is constantly seeking the co-operation of the best 
class of white people in order that the relation between 
the races may be of the most cordial nature. It is this 
class also who do not lose their heads though innocent 
members of the race be murdered by the mob. Though 
this class is rapidly increasing, it is still far inferior 
in number to the first class. 

The third class is composed chiefly of the ante-bel- 
lum Negroes. They are well advanced in age and are 
contented with their present lot. Many of them have 
waited for years for the forty acres and mule and hav- 
ing been disappointed in their expectation, they have 
lost all hopes. They are fast losing sight on the things 
of this world and gaining sight on the things of the 
world to come. Ofttimes, they sing, **You may have 
all this world, but give me Jesus." They are per- 
fectly harmless and have no earthly ambition. This is 
what the white man here calls a good Negro; for him 
they act as pall-bearers when he dies and for him they 
weep when he is gone. In many instances they erect 
monuments to his memory. 

Fallacy of the Master and the Bible Remedy. 

Since the recent riots that have occurred in Georgia, 
North Carolina, Tennessee, Arkansas and other South- 



82 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

em States, many white ministers and other prominent 
citizens of the South have been advocating a return to 
the master and Bible theory of slavery days, when, 
they say, there was no race problem. But every stu- 
dent of history knows that at the same time the master 
was carrying the Bible to his slaves this country was 
struggling with one of the greatest race problems that 
the world has ever witnessed and the slavery phase of 
this problem was settled by one of the bloodiest wars 
in the annals of history. Furthermore, the student of 
history knows that the master carried the lash more 
often to the slave's back than the Bible to the slave's 
heart ; that the lash kept the slave in subjection. 

If the relation between the races now seems most 
strained and the solution of the problem seems far- 
ther away than ever, we must be candid and seek the 
cause of failure in the methods that we have been 
using. In the past, the white man's idea of the solu- 
tion has been contrary to the Negro 's idea. The white 
man has been trying to circumscribe the Negro's 
sphere, at the same time, the Negro has been trying to 
kiow the truth which would make him free ; yet, both 
claim to be trying to solve the same problem. Be- 
fore a satisfactory solution of the problem can be had, 
it will be necessary for the best white people and the 
best class of Negroes to get together and agree as to 
what the solution must be. Is it to consist of the Ne- 
gro knowing his place and staying in it, or is it to 
consist of the Negro knowing the truth and being 
free? Which shall it be? Unless they can agree as to 
the answer there can be no satisfactory solution. 

In a democratic form of government having one 



IN THE BLACK BELT 83 

language, one history, one literature, one religion, one 
Bible, and one God, there can be only one man who is 
the sum total of these, only one man who is the typi- 
cally good democratic citizen, and this man will be 
known by his accomplishments and not by the color 
of his skin. If we should have two types, two men, 
then we must have two governments, two languages, 
two histories, two literatures, two religions, two Bi- 
bles, and two Gods. 

If the shiftless, ignorant, superstitious, and crim- 
inal class of Negroes is increasing, it is because the 
ruling class of white men have been limiting his edu- 
cation, disfranchising him, and in other ways trjdng 
to doom him to serfdom. The great race riot in At- 
lanta was simply the culmination of the ten months' 
campaigning of race hatred. Men who are now writ- 
ing resolutions and sound and sane editorials, were 
then rivaling each other in their abuse of the Negro. 
The nominee for governor seemingly, was to be given 
to the one who could prove himself the greatest enemy 
of the Negro. It is a divine and immutable law that 
if we sow the wind we will reap the whirlwind. 

Only One Road to the Solution. 

Lynchings and mobs will not solve the problem, for 
it has been proven that such actions beget crimes. De- 
priving him of educational advantages and disfran- 
chising him, will not suffice, for on the one hand this 
method produces ignorant Negroes, and on the other 
hand it increases in the white man the belief that the 
Negro has no rights which a white man is bound to 



84 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

respect. These two states of mind in the last analysis 
will always produce crime. The master and Bible the- 
ory will not solve it, because the criminal and lawless 
Negro does not attend church. There is but one true 
solution and that lies in compulsory education for all 
the children of the state with religious, moral and in- 
dustrial training. If the South is sincere in its ef- 
forts to help the Negro, or even if the ministers and 
other citizens who are now filling the daily press with 
suggestions as to the practical solution of this problem 
are sincere, they will advocate the enacting of compul- 
sory educational laws and see to it that all children 
between the ages of six and fourteen are kept in 
school. They will also advocate a more equitable divi- 
sion of the school fund between the races. The great 
factor in the solution of this problem is education and 
the Negro schools are the hope of the race. 

The Attitude of the North Towards This Problem. 

Just now, the attitude of the North towards this 
problem is that of an onlooker and well wisher. For 
a number of years the South has been saying to the 
North, ** Hands off, we understand the Negro and we 
can solve our own problem." The North, seemingly, 
has heeded this injunction and the press and politi- 
cians of the North, barring a few, have been inclined 
to take sides with the so-called conservative class of 
white men of the South. 

The philanthropist of the North, however, while be- 
ing a friend to the white South has been none the less 
a friend to the black South, and has kept constantly 



IN THE BLACK BELT 85 

aiding Negro education and it is the schools thus sup- 
ported that are doing the most effective work in the 
uplifting of the race. It was the wise guidance, judi- 
cious and calm leadership of the men in these schools 
that saved the day at Atlanta. All of these schools 
have the record of their graduates and ex-students 
opened to the public for inspection. And an impartial 
inspection of these records will show that these stu- 
dents and graduates have made since leaving school, 
according to their circumstances, as creditable a mark 
as the graduates and ex-students from any of our 
Northern schools. These schools do not give college 
training. 

In these perilous times when the race is passing 
through such trying ordeals, and when the souls of 
men are being tried, I trust that our friends will not 
forsake us. Our industrial schools and colleges and 
the better element of the race, need their sympathy, 
encouragement, and assistance now as never before. 
My prayer is for a double portion of their spirit and 
an increased amount of their assistance. 

The recent race troubles should not discourage us 
or our friends. In fact, we should be encouraged, 
for during these troubles the better element of the 
race has been severely tried and they have stood the 
test. Everywhere their advice has been for modera- 
tion, patience, and forbearance. It is true, we are 
troubled on every side, yet not distressed ; we are per- 
plexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not for- 
saken ; cast down, but not destroyed. Our records will 
show that we have been faithful over a few things, 
may we not retain the faith and trust of friends? 



86 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 14. 

The Greatest Menace of the South. 

In every age there are great and pressing problems 
to be solved, — problems whose solution will have 
seemingly, a far reaching and lasting effect upon the 
economic life of the country concerned. It was the 
case in this country from its very beginning and the 
same condition obtains today, although each section 
of the country has its own peculiar problems the true 
American citizen recognizes the fact that the success 
of one section in solving its problems will be bene- 
ficial to the entire nation. 

Perhaps, no section of this country has been con- 
fronted with more difficult problems than the South. 
I therefore, wish to present what I consider to be the 
greatest menace of this section, not as a prophet fore- 
telling future events, — but humbly expressing my 
views of the situation after careful study. 

If you were to ask the average white man of the 
South today what is the greatest menace to this sec- 
tion, his answer, undoubtedly, would be, the Negro 
and Negro domination. At least this would be the 
answer of the politician. That he would take this 
^dew, is shown by the great amount of legislation that 
has been enacted, aiming either directly or indirectly 
to retard the Negro's progress. I do not believe that 



IN THE BLACK BELT 87 

there has been one piece of legislation enacted in the 
South within the last thirty years for the express pur- 
pose of promoting the Negro's welfare. This does 
not mean, however, that the entire white South is 
against the Negro or that it means to oppose his ad- 
vancement. There are thousands of white men and 
women throughout the length and breadth of the 
South, who are today, laboring almost incessantly for 
the advancement of the Negro. To these, we owe a 
great debt of gratitude, and to these should be given 
much credit for what has been accomplished. This 
class of white southerns are not, as a rule, politicians 
and it is seldom, if ever, they are elected to office. 
When we speak of the average southern white man 
then, we have particular reference to the great horde 
of office seekers and politicians that infest the entire 
south-land. It is this class that will tell you that Ne- 
gro domination is the greatest menace to the South. 

Now, Negro domination may be a menace to the 
South, but it is certainly not the greatest. Neither is 
the extermination of our forests to be greatly feared. 
There are organizations and societies on foot in all 
parts of the South for the conservation of our forests. 

Southern citizenship is suffering much from child 
labor, but even this, although being a great danger to 
our future development and prosperity, cannot rightly 
be classed as our greatest menace. The one thing to- 
day, in which we stand in greatest danger, is the loss 
of the fertility of the soil. If we should lose this, as 
we are gradually doing, then all is lost. If we should 
save it, then all other things will be added. Our great 
need is the conservation and preservation of the soil. 



88 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

The increased crops which we have in the Sonth oc- 
casionally, are not due to improved methods of farm- 
ing, but to increased acreage. Thousands of acres of 
new land are added each year and our increase in farm 
production is due to the strength of these fresh lands. 
There is not much more woodland to be taken in as 
new farm lands, for this source has been well nigh 
exhausted. We must then, within a few years, expect a 
gradual reduction in the farm production of the South. 
Already the old farm lands that have been in cultiva- 
tion for the past fifty or fifty-five years are practically 
worn out. I have seen in my day where forty acres 
of land twenty or twenty -five years ago would produce 
from twenty to twenty-five bales of cotton each year, 
and from 800 to 1000 bushels of com. Now, these forty 
acres will not produce more than eight or nine bales of 
cotton and hardly enough corn to feed two horses. In 
fact, one small family cannot obtain a decent support 
from the land which twenty years ago supported three 
families in abundance. This farm is not on the hill- 
side, neither has it been worn away by erosion. It is 
situated in the lowlands, in the black prairie, and is 
considered the best fann on a large plantation. This 
condition obtains in all parts of the South today. This 
constant deterioration of land, this gradual reduction 
of crops year after year, if kept up for the next fifty 
years, will surely prove disastrous to the South. 

Practically, all the land in the black belt of the South 
is cultivated by Negroes and the farm production has 
decreased so rapidly during the last ten or fifteen years 
that the average Negro farmer hardly makes suflScient 
to pay his rent and buy the few necessaries of life. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 89 

Of course, here and there where a tenant has been 
lucky enough to get hold of some new land, he makes a 
good crop, but after three or four years of cultivation, 
his crop begins to decrease and this decrease is kept 
up at a certain ratio as long as he keeps the land. In- 
stead of improving, the tenant's condition becomes 
worse each year until he finds it impossible to support 
his family on the farm. Farm after farm is being 
abandoned or given up to the care of the old men and 
women. Already, most of these are too old and feeble 
to do effective work. 

Now, the chief cause of these farms becoming less 
productive, is the failure on the part of the farmers to 
add something to the land after they have gathered 
their crops. They seem to think that the land con- 
tains an inexhaustible supply of plant food. Another 
cause of this deficiency of the soil is the failure of the 
farmer to rotate his crop. There are farms being 
cultivated in the South today where the same piece 
of land has been planted in cotton every year for forty 
or fifty years. Forty years ago, I am told by reliable 
authority, that this same land would yield from one 
bale to one and a half per acre. And today it will take 
from four to six acres to produce one bale. 

Still another cause for the deterioration of the soil 
is erosion. There is practically no effort put forth on 
the tenant's part to prevent his farm from washing 
away. The hill-side and other rolling lands are not 
terraced and after being in use four or five years, 
practically all of these lands are washed away and as 
farm lands they are entirely abandoned. Not only are 
the hillside lands unprotected from the beating rains 



90 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

and flowing streams, but the bottom or lowlands are 
not properly drained, and the sand washed down from 
the hill, the chaff and raft from previous rains soon 
fill the ditches and creeks and almost any ordinary rain 
will cause an overflow of these streams. 

Under these conditions an average crop is impos- 
sible even in the best of years. At present, the South 
does not produce one-half of the foodstuff that it con- 
sumes and if the present condition of things continue 
for the next fifty years, this section of the country will 
be on the verge of starvation and famines will be a 
frequent occurrence. Of course, Negro starvation will 
come first, but white man starvation will surely follow. 
I believe, therefore, that I am justified in saying that 
there is even more danger in Negro starvation than 
there is in Negro domination. 

I have noticed in this country that the sins of the 
races are contagious. If the Negro in a community 
be lazy, indifferent, and careless about his farm, the 
white man in the community will soon fall into the 
same habit. On the other hand, if the white man is 
smart, industrious, energetic and persevering in his 
general makeup, the Negro will soon fall into line; so 
after all, whatever helps one race in the South will 
help the other and whatever degrades one race in the 
South, sooner or later mil degrade the other. But 
you may reply to this assertion by saying that the Ne- 
gro can go to the city and make an independent living 
for himself and family, but you forget that all real 
wealth must come from the soil and that the city can- 
not prosper unless the country is prosperous. When 
the country fails, the city feels the effect; when the 



IN THE BLACK BELT 91 

country weeps, the city moans ; when agriculture dies, 
all die. Such are the conditions which face us today. 
Now for the remedy. 

It is worth while to remember that there are ten es- 
sential elements of plant food. If the supply of any 
one of the elements fails, the crop will fail. These 
ten elements are carbon and oxygen taken into the 
leaves of the plant from the air as carbon dioxide, hy- 
drogen, a constituent of water absorbed through the 
plant roots ; nitrogen, taken from the soil by all plants 
also secured from the air by legumes. The other ele- 
ments are phosphorus, potassium, magnesium, cal- 
cium, iron and sulphur, all of which are secured from 
the soil. The soil nitrogen is contained in the organic 
matter or humus, and to maintain the supply of nitro- 
gen, we should keep the soil well stored with organic 
matter, making liberal use of clover or other legumes 
which have power to secure nitrogen from the inex- 
haustible supply in the air. 

It is interesting to note that one of the ablest chem- 
ists in this country. Prof. E. W. Clark of the U. S. 
Geological Survey, has said that an acre of ground 
seven inches deep contains sufficient iron to produce 
one hundred bushels of corn every year for 200,000 
years, sufficient calcium to produce one hundred bush- 
els of corn or one bale of cotton each year for 55,000 
years, enough magnesium to produce such a crop 7,000 
years, enough sulphur for 10,000 years and potassium 
for 2,600 years, but only enough phosporus for 130 
years. The nitrogen resting upon the surface of an 
acre of ground is sufficient to produce one hundred 
bushels of corn or a bale of cotton for 700,000 years ; 



92 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

but only enough in the plowed soil to produce fifty 
such crops. In other words, there are enough of eight 
of the elements of plant food in the ordinary soil to 
produce 100 bushels of coi*n per acre or a bale of cot- 
ton per acre for each year for 2,600 years; but only 
enough of the other two, phosphorus and nitrogen, to 
produce such crops for forty or fifty years. 

Let us grant that most of our farm lands in the 
South have been in cultivation for fifty or seventy-five 
years, and in many instances for one hundred years, it 
is readily seen that practically all of the phosphorus 
and nitrogen in the plowed soil have been exhausted. 
Is it any wonder then that we are having such poor 
crops? The wonder is that our crops have kept up 
so well. Unless a radical change is made in our mode 
of farming, we must expect less and less crops each 
year until we have no crops, or such little that we can 
hardly pay the rent. 

To improve and again make fertile our soils, we 
must restore to them the phosphorus and nitrogen 
which have been used up in the seventy-five or more 
crops that we have gathered from them. This is a 
herculean task but this is what confronts us and I for 
one, believe we can accomplish it. By the proper ro- 
tation of crops, including oats, clover, cowpeas, as well 
as cotton and com, and a liberal use of barn-yard 
manure and cotton seed fertilizer, all of the necessary- 
elements of plant food can be restored to our worn out 
soil. But the proper use of these require much pains- 
taken study. 

The black as well as the white should give this mat- 
ter serious consideration. The landlords and the ten- 



IN THE BLACK BELT 93 

ants should co-operate in this great work. The mer- 
chants and bankers must lend their aid and influence, 
preachers and teachers should be pioneers in this 
movement to save our common country. Our agricul- 
tural colleges should imprint their courses of study in 
something more than their annual catalogues. They 
should be imprinted in the minds and hearts of their 
students, and especially those who are to do farm 
work. Thus far, but very little general good has been 
accomplished by these schools. The reason is that the 
farmers, those who till the soil, have not had access 
to these schools and those who attend are not the farm- 
ing class, and do not take to farming as their life's 
work. The man who works the soil must be taught 
how to farm. We have in this state nine purely agri- 
cultural schools, each of which is a white institution. 
It is true that some agricultural training is given for 
Negroes at Normal, Montgomery and Tuskegee, but 
these are not purely agricultural schools and the great 
mass of Negro farmers cannot hope to attend them. 
If the Negro is to remain the farming class in the 
Black Belt of the South, then he must be taught at 
least the rudiments of the modem methods of im- 
proved farming. He must have agricultural schools 
and must be encouraged to attend them. The loss of 
the fertility of the soil is the greatest menace of the 
South. How can we regain this lost fertility, is the 
greatest question of the hour. 



94 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 15. 
The Negro Exodus. 

The Negro has remained in the South almost as a 
solid mass since his emancipation. This, in itself 
shows that he loves the South, and if he is now mi- 
grating to the East, North and West by the hundreds 
and thousands, there must be a cause for it. 

We should do our best to find out these causes and 
at least suggest the remedy, if we cannot accomplish 
it. The time has come for plain speaking on the part 
of us all. It will do us no good to try to hide the facts, 
because 'Hruth crushed to earth will rise again." 

In the first place, the Negro in this country is op- 
pressed. This oppression is greatest where the Negro 
population is greatest. The Negro population hap- 
pens to be greater in the South than in the North, 
therefore, he is more oppressed in the South than in 
the North. 

Take the counties in our own state. Some are known 
as white counties and others as black counties. In the 
white counties the Negro is given better educational 
opportunities than in the black counties. I have in 
mind one Black Belt county where the white child is 
given fifteen dollars a year for his education and the 
Negro child thirty cents a year. See the late Dr. 
Booker T. Washington's article, '*Is the Negro Hav- 



IN THE BLACK BELT 95 

ing a Fair Chancer' Now these facts are generally 
known throughout this State by both white and black. 
And we all know that this is unjust. It is oppression. 

This oppression shows itself in many other ways. 
Take for example the railroads running through the 
rural sections of the South. There are many flag sta- 
tions where hundreds of our people get off and on 
train. The railroads have at these little stops a plat- 
form about six feet square, only one coach stops at this 
point ; the Negro women, girls and boys are compelled 
to get off and on the train sometimes in water and in 
the ditches because there are no provisions made for 
them otherwise. 

Again, take the matter of the franchise. We all 
agree that ignorant Negroes should not be entrusted 
with this power, but we all feel that where a Negro 
has been smart and industrious in getting an educa- 
tion and property and pays his taxes, he should be 
represented. Taxation without representation is just 
as unjust today as it was in 1776. It is just as unfair 
for the Negro as it is to the white man, and we all, 
both white and black, know this. We may shut our 
eyes to this great truth, as sometimes we do, but it is 
unjust just the same. 

Take the matter of the courts. There is no justice 
unless the Negro has a case against another Negro. 
When he has a case against a white man you can tell 
what the decision will be just as soon as you know the 
nature of the case, unless some strong white man will 
come to the Negro's rescue. This, too, is generally 
known, and the Negro does not expect justice. 

None of us have forgotten the recent campaign of 



96 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

Mr. Underwood and Mr. Hobson for United States 
Senator from this State. Mr. Underwood's support- 
ers attacked Mr. Hobson because he defended the Ne- 
gro soldiers when he was Representative, and Mr. 
Hobson 's supporters attacked Mr. Underwood because 
they said that he had a Negro secretary in Washing- 
ton. Any politician who dares defend a Negro, how- 
ever just the cause may be, is doomed to political 
death. This is another fact which we all know. 

As yet, there has been no concerted actions on the 
part of the white people to stop mob violence. I know 
a few plantations, however, where the owners will not 
allow their Negroes to be arrested unless the officer 
first consults them, and these Negroes idolize these 
white men as gods, and so far not one of these Negroes 
has gone North. I repeat that there are out-croppings 
of these oppressions everywhere in this country, but 
they show themselves most where the Negroes are in 
largest numbers. 

' All of these sorrows the Negro has endured with 
patience and long suffering, and they may be all 
classed as the secondary cause of this great exodus. 

The primary cause is economics. The storms and 
floods destroy crops in the Black Belt section. These 
people are hungry, they are naked, they have no corn 
and had no cotton; so they are without food and 
clothes. What else can they do but go away in search 
of work? There are a great many wealthy white men 
here and there throughout the Black Belt section. 
They have large plantations which need the ditches 
cleared and new ones made to properly drain their 
farms. They could have given much work to these 



IN THE BLACK BELT 97 

destitute people ; but what have they done ! Nothing. 
They say that it is a pity for the Negro to go away in 
such large numbers, and so it is, but that will not stop 
them. They have it in their power to stop them by 
making the Negro's economic condition better here. 

The South must do more than make cotton and corn ; 
it must begin to manufacture some of the things that 
it uses. Why should we send our raw material to the 
North to be manufactured? Practically all the fur- 
niture we use comes from the North and they get the 
timber from us. The South must be both a manufac- 
turing as well as a farming section, if it would hold 
its own with the other sections of this great country. 
The capitalists of the South must turn loose their 
money if this section would come into its own. 

Thus far, the average white man of the South has 
been interested in the Negro from a selfish point of 
view. He must now become interested in him from a 
humanitarian point of view. He must be interested in 
his educational, moral and religious welfare. We 
know that we have many ignorant, vicious, and crim- 
inal Negroes, which are a disgrace to any people, but 
they are ignorant because they have not had a chance. 
Why I know one county in this State today with 10,000 
Negro children of school age and only 4,000 of these 
are in school, according to the report of the Superin- 
tendent of Education. We cannot expect ignorant 
people to act like intelligent ones, and no amount of 
abuse will make them better.' 

We know that our race is weak and that the white 
race is strong. We know also that our race is sick 
and that the white race is well or whole. Now, how 



98 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

should the strong treat the weak? How should the 
whole treat the sick? Would a strong man say, here 
is a weak man with a heavy burden, therefore, I will 
put more upon him? Would a well man say, here is a 
sick man, therefore, I shall give him less medical 
treatment? Then why do you say, here is the ignorant 
Negro, therefore let us give him less educational op- 
portunities than we give the white man? If the white 
man would be logical in this particular, he would say 
in the courts, because he is ignorant let us make his 
punishment less severe ; because he is weak, let us pro- 
tect him, because he is ignorant, let us give him greater 
educational opportunities. But this has not been done. 
There has not been one dollar increase in the Negro 
public school fund in the rural districts in twenty 
years ; if anything, it is less today than it was twenty 
years ago. 

Sometimes we hear it said that the white man of the 
South knows the Negro better than anybody else, but 
the average white man of the South only knows the 
ignorant, vicious and criminal class of Negroes bet- 
ter than anybody else. He knows little of the best 
class of Negroes. I am glad to say, however, that 
there are a few Southern white men who know the 
better class and know them intimately and are doing 
what they can to better the Negro's condition. I 
would to God that the number of these few could be 
increased a hundred fold. 

We used to deride the North for giving the Negro a 
chance to spend a dollar while withholding from him 
the opportunity to make one. But in the Providence 
of God all this has been changed by the great war in 



IN THE BLACK BELT 99 

Europe, which has created a labor scarcity in the 
North, East and West, and the Negro is now being 
given a chance to make a dollar there as well as spend 
one. The white man of the North is due no special 
credit for this, the credit belongs to God. He is the 
Eighteous Judge of all the earth and in the end He 
will do right. 

We will hear many tales of the sufferings of these 
people who go from this section. Many will die and 
some will come back, but still some will never return. 
You remember the fate of the Pilgrims, and the early 
colonists who first came to this country. You also 
know the fate of the men in the world war ; many must 
die that some be saved. It behooves us of the South 
who remain here, both white and black, to re-dedicate 
ourselves to unselfish service and try more and more 
each day of our lives to live up to the great principle 
laid down in the memorable Atlanta speech by the im- 
mortal Booker T. Washington when he said: ''In all 
things that are purely social we can be as separate as 
the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential 
to mutual progress.'^ 



100 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 16. 

The Negro and the Public Schools of the South, 

Too much praise cannot be given to the General 
Education Board, Dr. Dillard and Mr. Rosenwald, and 
others for what they have done and are doing to im- 
prove Negro public schools of the South, for in the last 
analysis it is there where the great masses of Negro 
children must be educated. 

We have in the South, as every one knows, a dual 
system of public schools, one for the whites and one 
for the Negroes. This accounts in part for our poor 
schools for both white and colored. Such a system is 
expensive and, of course, the Negro gets the worst of 
the bargain. This is not surprising to him; he ex- 
pects it in all such cases. He has been taught to ex- 
pect only a half loaf where others get a whole one, 
but in some cases he gets practically nothing from the 
State for education. For an instance, I know four or 
five Negro public schools in the Black Belt that get 
$37.00 for the school term of four months. It would 
be hard to figure out how a teacher can live in these 
days on $9.25 per month. But, as I have said, the 
agencies that I have mentioned above have done much 
and are doing more to improve these conditions. 

They endeavor to work with or through the State 
and countv^ oflScials wherever it can be done. This I 




in 

& 

H 

H 
m 
g 



o 
I? 

O 

cc 
B3 

W 
o 
■< 



IN THE BLACK BELT 101 

think is perfectly right and proper because the State 
must in the end direct the education of its subjects. 
But where this cannot be done, I think provision should 
be made for the thousands who are now being ne- 
glected. 

Ever since I succeeded in getting the late Miss Anna 
T. Jeanes of Philadelphia to give so largely towards 
the Negro public schools of the South, I have been 
thinking how this work could be carried on in har- 
mony with the State and county officials. The General 
Education Board, Dr. Dillard and Mr. Rosenwald have 
gone a long way towards solving this problem. 

At the present time every Southern State has a 
Superintendent of Education and a County Superin- 
tendent. These officers are elected by the people 
(white people, of course). Recently, however, there 
have been two other offices created, State Supervisor 
of Education for the Negro and County Supervisor. 
These officers are selected and not elected. I think the 
offices came about as a result of the efforts of the 
General Education Board and Dr. Dillard, and I think 
that the State Supervisors of Education are selected 
largely through them. 

Thus far all of the State Supervisors for Negro 
schools have been white men, and they in turn have 
been given the power to select the County Supervisor 
for the Negro schools, all of which are colored. 

These white men are not always able to get the 
most efficient persons for such work because I know 
of a few County Supervisors here and there who are 
not competent to do the work that has been intrusted 
to them. 



102 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

Now as the Negro has nothing to say as to who 
should be his State or County Superintendent of Edu- 
cation, it seems that in the matter of his State and 
County Supervisors he should have a word. (I think 
it is right and proper that the great funds for Negro 
education should be spent through the State and 
county officials wherever it can be done.) 

The State Superintendent ought to be given the 
power to select the most competent Negro educator 
to be State Supervisor of Negi'o Schools, and the 
County Superintendent ought to be given the same. 
Furthermore, as each State has a Negro Education 
Association which meets once a year, I think this As- 
sociation should recommend to the State Superinten- 
dent of Education a number of persons from whom 
he may select the State Supervisor. In each county 
we have an organization, which is known as the County 
Teacher Institute. This organization could recom- 
mend two or more persons to the County Superinten- 
dent from whom he might select the County Super- 
visor. 

I feel and think in this way because in order to 
really help the people one must go amongst them and 
know of their hardships, struggles, desires, sorrows, 
and their joys, must talk with them, eat and sleep with 
them and know their hearts. It would be asking too 
much of the Southern white man to do this. 

We know that in order to save the world God gave 
His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, who came to 
earth in the likeness of man, to save man. Perhaps 
He might have sent an Archangel or an Angel, but this 
work of redemption could only be done by His sending 



IN THE BLACK BELT 103 

a person who was a man, just like the men He was to 
save, and so it is with all great work of reformation 
and evolution. 

In order to help the people we must become like 
them. In Christ becoming like man is what we call the 
humiliation of the Incarnation, and in that lies the 
great secret of redemption and reformation. 

Again, I feel that this is a day of democracy, and 
that the Negro should be given a voice in the govern- 
ment of his schools. If this democracy, of which we 
are hearing so much, is for the white man alone, then 
I think that the Negro should know it, and if it is for 
all people he should know that. 

The white man owes it to the Negro to make this 
matter plain. 



104 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 17. 
Where Lies the Negroes Opportunity? 

The liberation and enfranchisement of four million 
of slaves in this country fifty years ago brought into 
the body politic a situation that has ever since been a 
bone of contention. Because of their ignorance, most 
of these people were without the slightest idea of the 
proper use, or the power, of the ballot, and but few 
could properly exercise this new and high prerogative. 

As long as the federal troops remained in the South 
and supervised and controlled the elections, these new- 
ly-made citizens retained their rights, but when, dur- 
ing President Hayes' administration, the troops were 
withdrawn, the South immediately set to work to rem- 
edy this condition. Starting with Mississippi in 1890, 
state after state disfranchised the Negro. Other dis- 
criminating laws have been enacted setting apart ''Jim 
Crow" apartments for the Negro on all public car- 
riers, establishing ''Jim Crow" schools, and, in fact, 
segregating the two races in all public places wherever 
it is possible. 

This action on the part of the South brought forth 
a storm of criticism from the North. The North ac- 
cused the South of treating the Negro unjustly and 
taking from him his constitutional rights. The South 
answered the North, not by claiming its policy towards 



IN THE BLACK BELT 105 

the Negro to be right, but by accusing the North of 
hypocrisy; but both sections agree that the Negro 
should be made as useful as his capacities will permit, 
and that he should seek the place where this use- 
fulness can be best secured. 

This long and constant agitation has led thoughtful 
students of the race problem to ask the question : 

Are the conditions in the South more conducive to 
the social efficiency of the Negro than those offered to 
him in the North? This is a vital question and a just 
answer to it will have a far-reaching and lasting effect 
upon the future welfare of the Negro race in this 
country. By social efficiency we mean that degree of 
development of the individual that will enable him to 
render the most effective service to himself, his fam- 
ily and to society. As has been defined, all will agree 
that social efficiency is the chief end of life. 

In the North the Negro lives mostly in the large 
cities, while in the South he lives mostly in the rural 
or country districts. Both the North and the South 
will admit this fact; the opportunities offered in the 
North then must be largely the opportunities such as 
large cities can offer, those in the South must be 
largely such as country districts can offer. 

But before further considering this question let us 
note for a moment the opportunities offered in the 
South and those offered in the North. It is true that, 
in the South, the Negro is disfranchised. It is also 
true that he suffers many other injustices in that sec- 
tion, but on the other hand he has a wide field of labor. 

First of all he has almost am unlimited opportunity 
to farm. He is better adapted to farm work in that 



106 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

section than either the native white man or the 
foreigner. He stands the heat better and can do more 
work under a burning Southern sun. 

In railroad construction the Negro is preferred. 
The coal of the South is dug by Negro labor, the iron 
ore is picked from the bowels of the earth by his 
brawny muscles. The Negro finds work at the foun- 
dries, the great pipe furnaces, the rolling mills, car 
factories and other industries in the mineral districts. 
He is eagerly sought for the sawmills, the turpentine 
orchard, and in fact for almost every industry of the 
South. 

Though the white man in the South is beginning to 
enter the field of industry, he has not entered to the 
extent that the Negro's place is, in the least, in jeop- 
ardy. Such are the opportunities offered the Negro in 
the South, though he is largely deprived of political 
and social rights. These facts are admitted by both 
the North and the South. 

Now what are the opportunities offered him in the 
North? First of all, the Negro is a free man in a 
political sense. He has the same right to vote that 
other citizens have and, too, he can vote according to 
the dictates of his own conscience. 

President Roosevelt in his speech at Tuskegee in 
1905, said that the colored people had opportunities 
for economic development in the South that are not 
offered to them elsewhere. 

In the large cities of the North, where the Negro 
mostly lives, the chances for good health and the pur- 
chase of a home are not so good. The man with little 
means, such as the Negro usually is, must live in either 



i 



IN THE BLACK BELT 107 

filthy streets or back alleys, where the air is foul and 
the environments are permeated with disease germs. 
For the lack of fresh air, pure food and proper exer- 
cise, his children are mere weaklings instead of strong 
and robust boys and girls. 

Dr. Robert B. Bean of Ann Arbor, in his essay on 
''The Training of the Negro" in Century Magazine 
of October, 1906, said that in the large cities the Negro 
is being forced by competition into the most degraded 
and least remunerative occupations; that such occu- 
pations make them helpless to combat the blight of 
squalor and disease which are inevitable in these 
cities, and therefore many of them are being destroyed 
by them. 

Mr. Baker says: 

''One of the questions I asked of Negroes whom I 
met both North and South was this : 

"'What is your chief cause of complaint?' 

"In the South the first answer nearly always re- 
ferred to the Jim Crow cars or the Jim Crow railroad 
stations ; after that, the complaint was of political dis- 
franchisement, the difficulty of getting justice in the 
courts, the lack of good school facilities, and in some 
localities, of the danger of actual physical violence. 

"But in the North the first answer invariably re- 
ferred to working conditions. 

" 'The Negro isn't given a fair opportunity to get 
employment. He is discriminated against because he 
is colored. ' " 

These conditions instead of promoting the social 
efficiency of the Negro, tend to degrade and demoralize 
him. The argument that the deprivation of the 



108 TWENTY-FIVE YEAKS 

Negro 's political and social rights in the South tends 
to crush his ambition, warp his aspirations and distort 
his judgment, is unsound, because his self-reliance, 
ambition and independence in the South can be traced 
partly to this very deprivation. By it he has been 
forced to establish his o^vn schools, his own churches, 
educate his own children and train his own ministers. 
All of these make for self-reliance and independence 
and are therefore c<)nducive to his social efficiencv. 



n 



IN THE BLACK BELT 109 



CHAPTER 18. 
School Problems of a Tuskegee Graduate. 

**Two distinct problems face the Tuskegee gradu- 
ate who goes forth as a leader of his people : the prob- 
lem of extending education to the masses of our peo- 
ple and the problem of so adjusting the people to their 
actual conditions that the two races will be able to live 
and work together in harmony and helpfulness. 

It may as well be admitted at the outset that the 
public schools in the rural districts of the lower South 
are not working toward this end. The condition of 
the public schools for our people in the Black Belt 
section of this state is disheartening. As unreason- 
able as it may seem, it is a fact that as the Negro pop- 
ulation increases, in this section, the appropriation for 
Negro schools decreases. In many places the schools 
have been abolished altogether. 

From almost every nook and corner of the South 
there comes a cry that the Negro as a laborer is unsat- 
isfactory. It is said that he is inefficient, unreliable, 
indolent, lazy, in short, that he is unfit to do the work 
the South wants done. Less than two decades ago it 
was just the opposite. Then, it was said that the Ne- 
gro was unfit for everything else except work. How 
inconsistent ! We admit that there is a labor problem 
in the South, but we deny that it is due wholly to the 



110 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

inefficiency of the Negro as a laborer. In the first 
place, the natural increase of the population of the 
South has not kept pace with the marvelous growth 
and development of her industries. This in itself 
would explain a scarcity of labor. Furthermore, it 
should be remembered that the most industrious, the 
most frugal, and the most thrifty Negroes of the 
South are rapidly changing from the wage hands, to 
contract hands, and the day laborers, to the renters of 
their own farms, while thousands of Negroes in dif- 
ferent parts of the South are establishing independent 
business entei-prises for themselves. The South can- 
not hire that class of Negroes from their work. This, 
again has a tendency to make labor scarce. Added to 
this is the fact that thousands of Negroes are moving 
into the cities. Some are going into other states seek- 
ing on the one hand better educational opportunities 
for their children, and on the other hand, protection 
from mobs and lynchers. This again has a depressing „ 
effect upon labor. I 

While these underlying causes seem sufficient to ac- 
count for the present labor troubles of the South, we 
must admit that there are entirely too many Negroes, 
particularly among those who work as wage-hands, 
contract-hands, and day laborers, who are ignorant 
and superstitious, too many who are gamblers and 
drunkards. Naturally, their work is not satisfactory. 
But they are not wholly to blame since they have had 
neither adequate educational opportunities, nor the 
proper home training. If they lack character, it is 
largely because they lack training. This is, as I un- 
derstand it, what the President means when he says 



IN THE BLACK BELT 111 

that ''ignorance is the most costly crop that any com- 
munity can produce.'* 

Graduates from Tuskegee, a few years ago, re- 
ceived from our illustrious Principal the injunction, 
*'Go ye into all parts of the South and change these 
conditions. ' ' 

I will now try to give an account of my steward- 
ship. I hail from Snow Hill, which is located in the 
heart of the Black Belt of this State, in a section 
where the colored people outnumber the white seven 
to one, and in the center of a colored population of 
more than 200,000. When we started work there 
twenty-five years ago the people as a whole were poor, 
ignorant, superstitious and greatly in debt. They had 
no special love for industrial training and not much 
general love for any kind of education. The so-called 
public schools were then running three months in the 
year and paying the teachers nine and ten dollars per 
month. We started work in a dilapidated one-room 
log cabin with three students and fifty cents in money. 
There was no state appropriation, neither was any 
church or society responsible for one dollar of its ex- 
penses. 

Today we have an institution of more than four 
hundred students and twenty- two teachers and officers. 
We have 1940 acres of land, twenty-four buildings, 
counting large and small, and fourteen industries in 
constant operation. Being in a farming section, how- 
ever, we are putting more stress upon agriculture. 

It is the aim of our institution to teach the beauty 
and dignity of all labor and inculcate a love for the 
soil and for agricultural life. In spite of the denial of 



112 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

political rights and of the poor educational opportuni- 
ties, and many other unjust discriminations, the 
South, just now, is the best place in this country for 
the Negro, and especially the agricultural section. 
We might as well recognize this fact and teach our 
people to act accordingly. 

Again, we aim to train leaders for the masses of 
our people ; for this purpose we need young men and 
young women imbued with the spirit of sacrifice and 
service who will go into these rural sections and teach 
our people how to live, how not to die; teach them 
how to live economically, to pay their debts, to huj 
land, to build better homes, better schools, better 
churches, and above all, how to lead pure and upright 
lives and become useful and helpful citizens in the 
community in which they live. Finally, we aim to train 
a high class of domestic servants. There need be no 
fear or uneasiness for we have an abundance of ma- 
terial for each class. But the worth of an institution 
is not determined by the acquisition of houses and 
land, neither by the bare statement of its aims, but b}^ 
its actual power to serve the practical, daily needs of 
the connnunity in which it exists. 

As a result of our twenty-five years' work at Snow 
Hill, we have about one thousand graduates and ex- 
students who have either finished the full or partial 
course at the institution and are now out in the world 
doing creditable work as teachers, farmers, mechan- 
ics, and domestic workers. Over fifty per cent of our 
students have bought homes since leaving school. 
Many have houses with five and six rooms. Wherever 
a Snow Hill student teaches the school term is length- 



IN THE BLACK BELT 113 

ened and the people are encouraged to buy land, build 
better homes, better school-houses and better churches. 

The people have not only been helped by our stu- 
dents and graduates, but they have been helped di- 
rectly through our Negro conference and Black Belt 
Improvement Society, 

Twenty-five years ago the people in the neighbor- 
hood of the school did not own more than ten acres of 
land, while today they own more than twenty thousand 
acres. Twenty-five years ago the one-room log cabin 
was the rule, today it is the exception. Twenty-five 
years ago the majority of the farmers were in heavy 
debt and mortgaged their crops, today many of the 
farmers now have bank accounts, while a few years 
ago they did not know what a bank account was. 
Throughout the community they are building better 
homes, better churches, better school-houses, and the 
relation between the races is cordial. 

Just a word about our Black Belt Improvement So- 
ciety. This organization has ten degrees of member- 
ship and any one of good moral standing desiring to 
better his condition, can become a member of the first 
degree. A member of the second degree, however, 
must own a little property, at least three chickens, and 
a pig. A member of the third degree must own a cow, of 
the fourth degree he must own an acre of land, a mem- 
ber of the fifth degree must have erected on that acre 
a house having at least three rooms, a member of the 
sixth degree must own twenty acres of land, of the 
seventh degree must own forty acres of land, and of 
the eighth degree must own sixty acres, etc., until they 
reach the tenth degree. 



114 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

Then we have an annual fair at which prizes are 
given to those who have excelled in any of the agricul- 
tural products, or those who have had the best gar- 
dens, or who have kept the best house during the year. 
a special prize is given to the party who has bought 
the most land during the year. 

This society has several committees. It has a com- 
mittee on education. This committee holds meetings 
in the various communities to arouse in the people an 
interest in education. It encourages them to build 
better school-houses, to extend the school term and it 
keeps their children in school. It is the duty of the 
committee on labor to gather together those of our 
race who still work as contract-hands, wage-hands, 
day-laborers, and domestic servants, and impress upon 
them the necessity of rendering the best service, tell 
them that the race is judged more by what they do 
than what we do, and how great their responsibility is. 

The farming committee is always active, trying to 
create in the people a real love for agricultural life, 
trying to show them that the opportunities which the 
country offers us are superior to those offered in the 
cities. Other committees are the committee on good 
government, committee on business, and committee on 
good roads. The influence for good this society is ex- 
erting throughout the section can hardly be esti- 
mated. Such is the nature of the work we are doing 
at Snow Hill.*' 



IN THE BLACK BELT 115 



CHAPTER 19. 

Benefits Wrought by Haedships. 

The word '^Offence" is a general and somewhat in- 
definite term. As defined by the various dictionaries, 
it means an attack, an assault, aggression, injustice, 
oppression, transgression of a law, misdemeanor, tres- 
pass, crime and persecution. In all of these definitions 
there is implied an act considered as disagreeable if 
not harmful to the recipient. 

Of the various nations of the earth, those that are 
most powerful and that have accomplished most good 
are those which have endured and have survived the 
most offences. They have grown by reason of the ob- 
stacles which they have overcome. It is singular, yet 
it is true, that offences have never destroyed a nation. 
Those nations which have been destroyed have been 
destroyed not by attack from without, but by their 
own internal weakness. 

Societies that are accomplishing the most good for 
the uplift of humanity today are those against whom 
the most offences have been committed. Take the 
Christian Church, the greatest of all societies. Who 
can enumerate the offences which have been committed 
against the church? Herod tried to behead it, but could 
not ; Pilate tried to crucify it, but instead sanctified it ; 
Paul persecuted it and it redeemed him ; poor drunken 



116 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

and debauched Nero poured forth the fury of his wrath 
against it in every conceivable, wicked way. He delib- 
erately set fire to the city of Rome and accused the 
Christians of the deed. He gave feasts in his garden 
and the bodies of the Christians were burned as torch- 
es in the evenings. Their groans and agonies con- 
stituted the music for their dance and carousal. Other 
Christians were fed to half-starved lions. But through 
it all the church has become more powerful and more 
glorious than before; while Nero's name will forever 
be a stench to the nations of the earth. In this parti- 
cular case the prophecy of Christ ''That offences must 
need be but woe unto the man by whom the offence 
Cometh" is fulfilled. As with the church, so with all 
other societies and institutions that are doing good 
in the community, they endure their offences. 

The history of the growth and rise of the various 
races will show that they, too, have had their bitter 
as well as their sweet. In fact, they have fought for 
every inch of territory which they now possess. 

Let us consider some of the benefits which have been 
derived from our hardships. That the enslavement of 
my people was a serious offence there is no doubt. I 
should be the last one to apologize for slavery; but, 
after all, we brought more out of slavery than we car- 
ried into it. We went into it heathens, with no lan- 
guage, and no God; we came out American citizens, 
speaking the proud Anglo-Saxon tongnie, and serving 
the God of all the earth. 

Under the leadership of old Richard Allen and other 
noted colored divines, the Negro church was set up 
under a bush harbor, but today they own church prop- 



IN THE BLACK BELT 117 

erty in this country valued at more than $26,000,000. 
As a result of the educational offences committed 
against the Negro, today he has 35,000 Negro teach- 
ers and more than seventeen million dollars' worth 
of school property in this country. The Negro has 
been disfranchised, but he is more capable of the ballot 
today than ever before. Though the disfranchisement 
of the Negro has wrought great harm to our Democrat- 
ic form of goverimaent, it has increased in the Negro 
the spirit of patience, self-reliance, self-sacrifice, and, 
in fact, it has enhanced in him all of those virtues 
which make for true manhood and womanhood. 

In the business world there has been less offence 
committed against the Negro than in any other way. 
What little there has been was rather slight and it has 
been only in recent years that the Negro has begun to 
detect it, and establish business of his own. He has 
not so many stores as he has schools, nor so many 
shops as he has churches, yet the reports of the Negro 
National Business League, which recently met in At- 
lanta, will show that he is making rapid progress in 
the business world. 

All great men as well as races and nations suffered 
their offences. Washington, Lincoln and Grant were 
great because they had to endure hardships. Robert 
Small, Frederick Douglas and Booker Washington are 
great because they were slaves. 

The Negro of the South was emancipated 50 years 
ago without education, without money, without clothes, 
without food, without even a place to rest his head, 
and, in many instances, without a name. His greatest 
possession was ignorance. If, during slavery, he was 



118 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

taught maiiy useful and helpful lessons, during slav- 
ery, also, he was denied the opportunity of exercising 
and developing the greatest requisite of independence, 
self-reliance. He was a new-born babe, as a ship 
in mid-ocean without a rudder. It was nothing more 
than natural for him at times to drift, at times to wan- 
der, and still at other times to steer in the wrong direc- 
tion. 

Consequently, he made many mistakes, some of them 
serious. He made mistakes in religion, mistakes in 
economics, and mistakes in politics, but to my mind 
his greatest mistake was made in the matter of edu- 
cation. Until the year '95 the masses of our people 
in the Black-Belt section of the South believed that the 
end of education was to free one from manual labor, 
especially from the labor of the farm. They further- 
more believed that it was the end of education. to take 
the people from the country to the cities and otherwise 
fit them for only three callings, namely, of teacher, of 
preacher, and of politician. This conception of edu- 
cation was entertained not only by the masses, but 
many of our schools and colleges encouraged the same 
view. 

Just at this period, when the relation between the 
races seemed most strained, there loomed on the hori- 
zon the Booker "Washington idea, '^That the kind of 
education most needed by our people was that which 
would dignify, beautify, and make attractive and desir- 
able country life and at the same time fit our people 
for high and useful citizenship.'' Mr. "Washington 
further contended that any education which did not 
manifest itself in the practical daily life of the people 
was not worthy of the name. 



IN THE BLACK BELT 119 

This idea of Mr. Washington was indeed timely, 
but, like all other great movements for reform, it was 
not accomplished without obstacles, but in the face 
of many dangers and difficulties. But the dawn of a 
new day is breaking and industrialism seems to be the 
spirit of the age. The very fact that the Negro was 
not allowed to attend the white man's school in the 
South gave the Negro a Tuskegee. The fact that no 
white educator was willing to bear the black man's 
burden gave him a Booker Washington. For similar 
reasons the Negro has been forced to build his own li- 
braries, his own theatres, his own hotels, and to estab- 
lish many other business enterprises. 

Hardships, trials, persecution, and offences are a 
primary necessity in life. We ought not, therefore, 
complain of them; our trials have made us what we 
are. 

This is pre-eminently a progressive age. The world 
no longer stands still. We are either going forward 
or backward, rising or falling; there is no such thing 
as standing still. Those phases of our human activi- 
ties that are standing still are dying. This forward 
movement is not accomplished without obstacles, and 
what is true of politics and business is equally true of 
individuals. The greatest strength comes from over- 
coming — from resistance and struggle. 



120 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 



CHAPTER 20. 
The Negro and the World War. 

No book written in the year 1918 would be complete 
without a word about this awful conflagration which is 
now sweeping over the earth. 

One sometimes thinks that the end is near and that 
the world is being destroyed. 

We know that everything that has been invented to 
advance civilization is now being used to destroy it. 
Our one consolation is that however imperfect we may 
have been as a nation, we know that our cause is just 
and because of this we believe that in the end we will 
and must win. The right has always been more pow- 
erful than the wrong, even more powerful than might 
and it will prove true in this case. 

I am being constantly asked by white men in both 
the North and South, ^'How does the Negro regard 
this war and what about his willingness to share in 
its responsibilities. ' ' I have only one answer for such 
questions: ''The Negro now knows but one word 'Loy- 
alty.' He is no alien, he owes no allegiance to any 
other country, there is no hyphen to his name, he is 
all American, he is willing to fight and die, that the 
world might be made safe for democracy." He only 
asks that he may share in this democracy. 

Already there are practically 200,000 Negroes who 



IN THE BLACK BELT 121 

have been called to the colors and thousands of others 
are expected to be called. I hear of but few if any 
slackers among them, while thousands of slackers of 
other races are being rounded up by the police in va- 
rious cities throughout the country. 

The 200,000 Negro soldiers who are now at the front 
and in the camps have gone with as brave hearts as 
any American citizen. They say, '* Silver and gold, 
have I but little, but I give my life to Uncle Sam, it is 
all that I can do." 

The Negro is not only furnishing men to the Na- 
tional Army, but he is doing his part to support the 
boys at the front. He has bought Liberty Bonds to 
the fullest extent. Many of his business organiza- 
tions, societies and lodges have bought large blocks of 
these bonds. 

On Sunday morning, June 14th, Dr. Cortland L. 
Myers of Tremont Temple, Boston, in his sermon told 
of an incident of an old colored woman who had worked 
hard and saved up three hundred dollars in order that 
she might not at the end be buried in the paupers' 
field, but when she read that the United States wanted 
money, took all she had and carried it to the bank to 
the agent. When the agent gave her the Liberty Bond 
and told her that she would get four per cent on her 
money, she was utterly surprised and said, ''Lord, 
Boss, I thought I was giving this money to Uncle 
Sam." This woman had only three hundred dollars, 
but she gave all. 

You remember what Christ said about those who 
were contributing to a great cause on one occasion. 
Many made large gifts, but one poor woman came u-p 



122 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

and gave a penny which was all she had. Christ on 
commenting on this to his Disciples said that she had 
given more than all, because she had given all she had. 
Many incidents of this kind may be cited as proof of 
the Negroes' loyalty in this struggle. 

Not only in the Liberty Loan drive, but in the Bed 
Cross and War Savings Stamp drives, the Negro is 
doing his part. There are Negro agents all over the 
South who are educating our people up to what the 
Government at Washington wants. Such schools as 
Snow Hill, Laurinburg, Denmark, Utica, Okalona and 
Calhoun and many others are serving as bureaus of 
information for this war work among the Negroes. 

Nor is this all. The Negro is doing his part in the 
various industries of the country. I have heard of 
many strikes and walk-outs since we entered the war, 
but not once have a group of Negroes struck. In some 
places where a few are working with the unions, the 
unions have forced them out at the risk of their lives, 
but where he is free, nowhere in this country has the 
Negro struck during the war. 

He is doing his bit on the farm. Everywhere the 
Negro farmers, man, woman and child, believe that 
they can help win the war by making a good crop and 
they are at work on the farm trying to do this, so you 
see that the Negro in every way is in the war to a fin- 
ish. 

These are answers to questions asked me by the 
white man both North and South as to the attitude of 
the Negro toward this world's war. 

But on the other hand the Negro soldiers and civil- 
ians are not asleep and they too are asking such ques- 
tions as these : — 



IN THE BLACK BELT 123 

"Are we to share in the democracy for which we are 
giving our lives? 

When the world is made safe for democracy, will the 
entire country be made safe for it? 

Will my father, mother, sister and brother be allowed 
to share in this democracy? 

Will lynchings and burnings at the stake cease? 

Will the white man who makes the laws allow these 
laws to take their course? 

Will they allow us or give us a fair trial before their 
courts, which have only white men as jurors? 

Will they cease taxing us without representation? 

Will they give us an equal part of the money spent for 
education? (In many places in the Black Belt the 
Negro child receives thirty cents a year for edu- 
cation, while the white child receives fifteen dol- 
lars.) Will the Negro be given any work that he 
is capable of doing and not be denied it on account 
of his color? 

Will it be possible for a Negro travelling from Ala- 
bama to California or Massachusetts, to find a 
place to sleep at night? 

Will the baggage masters and the conductors of the 
South ever treat the Negro passengers with cour- 
tesy and respect and finally will the white man in 
the South after making the laws for the qualifica- 
tions of voters, allow a Negro to vote if he meas- 
ures up to these qualifications? 

The Negro does not care what these qualifications 
may be. He only wants a fair chance in case he meas- 
ures up to them. 



124 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

The Negro only seeks equal rights and justice before 
all the courts of the land. He expects this because of 
his teachings. He was brought to this country against 
his will, even against his protest. He has been given 
the white man's language, his history, his literature, 
his Bible and even his God. His aspirations, inspira- 
tions and desires have been brought about as a result 
of these and if they are wrong, the white man is to 
blame. The Negro has been taught to believe that God 
is no respecter of persons and therefore his subjects 
should not be. He thought that if he did what other 
men did he would obtain the same results. 

Now evidently the Negro is a man. He loves as 
other men do, he lives as others do, he dies as others 
die, he has joy and sorrow as others do, even hates as 
others do, laughs and cries as others. He must there- 
fore, be a man as man is the only being which pos- 
sesses these faculties. Then he asks for a man's 
chance and the world will never be right until this is 
given him. The world will never be safe for democ- 
racy until all the races of the earth are allowed to 
share in it. 

In answer to all of the f oreging questions asked me 
by both the white and black, I have said that things 
will be better for the Negro after the war. I have said 
that it was impossible for the world to be made safe 
for democracy unless every county in the South is 
made safe for it. 

I have gone as far as to cite a recent occurrence in 
Camden, Wilcox County, Alabama, where more than 
one hundred and forty Negroes were sent to the can- 
tonments and I was asked to be one of the speakers on 



IN THE BLACK BELT 125 

the occasion. The white people there gave the Ne- 
groes a great banquet and in my remarks after thank- 
ing them for their hospitality, I said ''That it would 
be foolish and cowardly on my part to stand here in 
your presence and say that as a race we have no griev- 
ances, for we have them, but this is no time to air 
them. When the house is on fire it is no time for fam- 
ily quarrels, but the thing to do is to put the fire out 
and then we can adjust the quarrels after. 

''Today our National house is on fire and it is the 
duty of every man, both white and black, rich and poor, 
great and small, to rise in his might and put the fire 
out and when the fire is out, we will see you about these 
grievances. ' ' 

I went a step further and told that "already the 
war had brought some good results as this was the 
most democratic day that this little city had ever seen. 
Before the war, two expressions were commonly used 
by the white man and the Negro. The Negro's ex- 
pression was this: — "I haven't any country," and the 
white man's expression was: — "This is a white man's 
country." Now both of these classes are saying, 
' ' This is our country. ' ' I further said that ' ' we should 
win this war, because democracy was right and autoc- 
racy is wrong, and if we lose, and God forbid that we 
should, the fault will not be in democracy, but it will 
be due to the fact that we are not practicing what we 
preach." 

At the close of my remarks many of the white citi- 
zens, including the judge, the sheriff, lawyers and 
other prominent men came forward and congratulated 
me on what I had said and some said that the white 



126 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

people of Camden needed more of such plain talk. I 
took these signs to mean that better things were com- 
ing for the Negro of the South after the war, but I 
must admit that when I read in the evening papers of 
June 27th that Senator John Sharp Williams of Mis- 
sissippi had practically defeated the bill for women 
suffrage, because he said that he favored the vote for 
white women only and that the bill in its present form 
would not be allowed in his state — I must confess that 
this action almost took away all of my hopes espe- 
cially after there was no one to rise and rebut his ar- 
gument. There was no one in the United States Sen- 
ate to speak for democracy for all the people. Now I 
think that just such spirit as this exhibited by that 
great Senator from Mississippi is at the foundation 
of this world's war and until that spirit is crushed, 
I fear that this war will continue. For of a truth, 
**God is no respecter of persons." 

Now I have given my answers to both the Negro and 
the white man. What is the answer of the white man? 

Are we fighting for democracy for all the people, 
or are we fighting for democracy for the white man 
only? 

This question has never been answered by the white 
man, but it must be answered after this great war. 



APPENDIX 

Address Delivered by Mr. Edwards on the Twentieth 
Anniversary of His Graduation from Tuskegee. 

' * Two decades ago, twenty members constituting the 
class of '93, received their commission from the illus- 
trious Principal of this great institution on yonder 
hill, to go ye into all parts of the South and teach and 
preach Tuskegee 's gospel. This gospel was then as 
it is now, a gospel of service. Now after the lapse of 
twenty years we have assembled here to review the 
efforts of past years. Although twenty years are not 
long enough in which to record the life's work of a 
class, it is sufficiently long to indicate the direction in 
which this work is tending. 

* * So we come today, not so much to tell what we have 
accomplished as to tell what we are doing to renew 
our allegiance to our Alma Mater, and to assure its 
Principal and members of the Faculty that our motto, 
"Deeds Not Words," is still our guiding star. Four 
of our number have passed to the great beyond. We 
must therefore wait a later and greater day to hear 
their record read or told. Of the remaining sixteen, 
we have lost all communication with two, and it would 
be mere speculation for us to say what these two are 
doing. We can only hope, and do most fervently pray, 
that wherever they are they have with them the deep 



128 APPENDIX 

and abiding spirit of Tuskegee, and this we believe 
they have. This leaves then only fourteen live, vigor- 
ous and active members with which we are concerned. 
All of these, except one, have been engaged more or j 
less in teaching. They are located as follows: 

' ' Two in Normal School at Snow Hill, Alabama ; one 
at the head of a large Industrial School at Topeka, , 
Kansas ; three in Birmingham, Alabama ; one teaching 
in Miles Memorial College ; one in Government Ser- j 
vice ; one doing settlement work ; two are in Asheville, ' 
N. C, where they are engaged in teaching and doing 
settlement work respectively; another teaching in 
Dothan, Alabama; two in Montgomery, one of these 
teaching and the other doing settlement work; one in 
Selma, Alabama, farming and doing extension work; 
one at the head of a prosperous Industrial School at 
China, Alabama, and one teaching in Georgia. All 
have been remarkably successful and they have 
touched and made better the lives of more than five 
thousand souls. While losing their lives for others, 
they have saved their own somewhat, materially. 

' ' Having been out on the tempestuous sea of life for 
twenty years amidst both storms and calms, it may not 
be out of place for us to speak a word of warning or 
make a few suggestions to those who are to set sail 
today, and to those who hope to go to sea at a later 
date. This, then, is our message. First of all, it is nec- 
essary for you to know where the work of the world is 
to be done. 

*'0n one occasion during Christ's sojourn on earth. 
He took a few of His disciples with Him upon the 
mountain and there transfigured Himself. He clothed 



APPENDIX 129 

Himself in heavenly beauty and splendor ; He arrayed 
Himself in His Godlike power. These men were so 
overjoyed at this manifestation of His glory and 
power, that old Peter, impulsive as he was, spoke out 
and said: 'Lord, it is good for us to be here, if it be 
Thy will, let us build here three tabernacles, one for 
Thee, one for Moses, and one for Elias.' The place 
was so glorious that they wanted to abide there. But 
at the same time the multitude was waiting at the foot 
of the mountain, hungering and desiring to be fed; 
naked and desiring to be clothed; sick, and desiring 
to be healed. The work of Jesus Christ and His dis- 
ciples was not on the transfigured mountain, but at the 
foot among the masses. So as they came down from 
the mountain, there met Him a man whose son was 
a lunatic, desiring that the Master might heal him. 

"So on occasions like this when Dr. Washington 
takes us upon the mountain and reveals to us Tuske- 
gee in all of her beauty and splendor, we are likely, 
in such a state of ecstasy, to cry out saying. Principal 
Washington, it is good for us to be here, and let us 
build three tabernacles; one for thee, one for Arm- 
strong, and one for Douglas. But my friends, we can- 
not abide here. We must go down to the foot of the 
mountain among the masses. We must go out into the 
rural districts for there it is that the people are a hun- 
gry and thirsty crowd, and there it is that the harvest 
is great, but the laborers are few, and there it is the 
work of the world must be done. 

** Another suggestion is, that as you go out to work, 
you will find that for the most part Negro society is 
built upon a false basis. Instead of being built upon 



130 APPENDIX 

the sound basis of merit and character, it is built upon 
display; instead of being built upon substance, it is 
built upon shadow. 

**We need young men and women who have confi- 
dence in themselves; confidence in the race, and abid- 
ing faith in God. We need young men and women who 
are more interested in the opportunity to make a dol- 
lar than in the privilege to spend one. We need young 
men and women who are imbued with the spirit of sac- 
rifice and service, whose mission is, *Not to be minis- 
tered unto, but to minister. ' We need young men and 
women with a purpose. 

* ' To illustrate what we mean by a purpose, we take 
the action of Grant during the late Civil War. When 
Winfield Scott and McClellan had practically failed 
with the army of the Potomac and things were look- 
ing very dark for the Union forces, Lieutenant U. S. 
Grant was placed in command of all the Union forces. 
From the date of his command, his purpose was: 'On 
to Richmond. * Day after day his command was : * On 
to Richmond.' When they had rivers to ford and 
mountains to climb, his command was: 'On to Rich- 
mond. ' At times thousands were laid low by the rav- 
age of disease, but his command was: 'On to Rich- 
mond.' When the cannon of his enemy roared like 
thunder and bullets like lightning struck his men down 
by the tens of thousands, his command was: 'On to 
Richmond.' He received letters and telegrams by the 
thousands saying: 'My God, General, are you going to 
kill all of our husbands, all of our sons, our brothers? 
Are you going to make all of the North a land of wid- 
ows and orphans?' His reply was: 'On to Richmond.' 



APPENDIX 131 

When rivers of blood were before him, flames of fire 
swept over his forces, his command was: *0n to Rich- 
mond. ' And the command never ceased until Lee sur- 
rendered his sword to Grant at Appomattox Court 
House. We repeat, that for the work that lies before 
us, we need young men and women with a purpose. 

"A third warning is, that we must not mistake the 
aim and end of education. You will find somewhere 
in the Bible a sentence like this: 'And the word was 
made flesh and it dwelled among us.' The word had 
been spoken by Abraham; Moses thundered it from 
Mt. Sinai's rugged brow; Ezekiel preached it; David 
sang it; Solomon proclaimed it; Jeremiah prophesied 
it; Elijah saw it in the whirlwind; Moses saw it in 
the burning bush, and Isaiah saw it and in amazement 
cried: 'Who is this that cometh from Edom with dyed 
garments from Bazrohf this that is glorious in his ap- 
parel, traveling in the greatness of His strength?' 
But my friends, none of this would do. Speaking the 
word would not atone; hearing it would not redeem; 
and seeing it would not save. The word had to be 
made flesh and blood in the person of Jesus Christ, the 
Son of God, and then come down on earth and live,, 
move, and dwell among us. 

"As with the word, so with education. You have 
been here a number of years trying to obtain it. You 
have heard education from your teachers; you have 
heard it in the class-rooms ; you have heard it from the 
platform ; you have heard it in the Sunday-School ; you 
have gleaned it from your text-books; you have sung 
it; you have prayed it; you have spoken it; you have 
walked it; you have assumed it. But none of these 



132 APPENDIX 

will suffice. Education, in order to be real, must be 
applied; in order to be effective, it must be digested 
and assimiliated. It must become a part of your flesb 
and blood ; it must transform you into a new creature 
and then go out and move, live and dwell among us. 

''And now a final word for the class of '93. What 
of its loyalty to Tuskegee, our Alma Mater! It is 
true that at times our purposes and aims have been 
misunderstood and misconstructed ; at times your at- 
titude towards us has been misinterpreted, but not 
once have we doubted your love. We hope that you 
have never mistrusted ours. 

''It is true that at times we are troubled on every 
side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in 
dispair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but 
not destroyed. Through all of this, our love and loy- 
alty to dear old Tuskegee has never wavered, and now 
as a token of this love and loyalty, I hand to Dr. Wash- 
ington as a Memorial Scholarship for the class of '93, 
a check for one thousand dollars." 

I think that this act pleased Dr. Washington more 
than anything that had ever been done by the class of 
'93. We all were proud of this because we wanted Dr. 
Washington to see that we had not forgotten what he 
had done for us. We wanted to do this during his 
lifetime, and this we succeeded in doing. 

An address before the Alabama State Teachers ' As- 
sociation, held in Montgomery, Ala., the subject being : 

'^ School Building Under Difficulties." 

"There is no work pertaining to the welfare of our 
race that is of more importance than that of the 



APPENDIX 133 

teacher, and no class of people has a harder task to 
perform than the earnest and conscientious Negro 
teacher of today. 

**The problems that come before the large educa- 
tional associations of this and other countries, are 
problems dealing largely with the child, such as the 
treatment of backward children, treating of abnormal 
children, care of the blind, of the deaf, special treat- 
ment for incorrigibles, the feeble minded, and many 
other kinds of mental and physical defectives. 

** Other problems that demand the attention of such 
meetings, are problems dealing with the teacher, his 
preparation and qualification for the various grades 
of our schools, for instance, preparation of the teacher 
for the elementary school, for the secondary school, 
and for colleges and universities. These associations 
also give much time to such subjects as The Relation of 
Education to Eeal Life; The Defects of our Present 
School System; and how these defects may be reme- 
died. In other words, how can the school better fit 
the student to take his place in the social and economic 
life of today? I repeat, these are the problems which 
largely consume the time of these educational meet- 
ings. They are vital and far-reaching, and demand 
the closest attention of our wisest and best educators. 
They are not racial; not sectional; not even national, 
but are universal in their scope and teachers in all 
parts of the world must contend with them, 

''The average Negro teacher of the South today must 
assume his share of the burden of these problems along 
with other teachers, whether he wills it or not. In 
addition to this he has to deal with the serious prob- 



134 APPENDIX 

lem of his bread and butter. This makes the burden 
of the Negro teacher of a two-fold nature, and in this 
respect he is at a disadvantage of the average Ameri- 
can teacher. He has not as yet been able to live up to 
the Biblical injunction, 'Take no thought for your 
life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, nor yet 
for your body, what ye shall put on.' No teacher 
can do his best so long as there is doubt and uncer- 
tainty about his daily bread. 

**The Negro student who finishes at one of our 
higher institutions of learning today, and goes forth 
to teach, does not find everything to his liking. He 
soon learns that there has been no voice before him 
crying in the wilderness saying: 'Prepare ye the way 
of the teacher, make straight in the desert a highway 
for our educator.' He learns here for the first time 
that in addition to the ordinary educational problems, 
it is for him to exalt every valley, make low every hill 
and mountain, make the crooked straight, and the 
rough places plain. He finds no way prepared, he 
must make one ; he finds no school-house ready, he must 
build one; he finds no people anxiously awaiting him, 
he must persuade them. In many cases the Negro 
teacher who is imbued with the spirit of sacrifice and 
service can truly say as did the Master, 'The foxes 
have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the 
teacher who would redeem a poverty stricken and ig- 
norant people, has not where to lay his head. ' 

''The purpose of the Snow Hill Institute is to pre- 
pare young men and young women to go into commu- 
nities where they propose to work and influence the 
people to stop living in rented one-room log cabins, 



APPENDIX 135 

buy land, and build dwelling houses having at least 
four rooms, and thus improve the home life of the 
people. Second, to influence the people to build better 
school-houses and lengthen the school terms and thus 
by arousing educational interest, assist in bringing 
about the needed reform that is so essential to eco- 
nomic and upright living; and finally to promote good 
character building. To some extent the purpose is 
being realized, for more than one thousand different 
students who have been more or less benefited by hav- 
ing spent a year or more under its guidance, are lead- 
ing sober and useful lives. Two hundred fifteen have 
either been granted certificates or diplomas, and are 
engaged as follows : Fifty are teachers, twenty-five are 
housekeepers, three of the teachers have founded 
schools of their own, one at Laurinburg, N. C, one at 
West Butler, Alabama, and one at Eichmond, Ala- 
bama. 

"Though the majority of the ex-students are lo- 
cated in the Black Belt of Alabama and are engaged 
principally in farming, a large number of them are 
found in the following states : Mississippi, Louisiana, 
Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas." 



APPENDIX 

ADDRESS DELIVERED BY MR. EDWARDS IN 
BESSEMER, ALABAMA 



" THE SIGNS OF TIMES " 

It was customary in ancient times for nations to 
build walls around their cities to protect them from 
the enemy. War was the rule, and peace the excep- 
tion. Nations therefore spent most of their time in 
preparing for war, as they believed that their advance- 
ment depended largely upon their conquest. Watch- 
men would be placed here and there on the walls to 
keep a sharp look-out for the enemy and when detected, 
would warn the inhabitants of his approach. As a 
result of these warlike times and military activities, 
some of the world's greatest generals were produced 
during that period. 

Undoubtedly, conditions here mentioned, existed be- 
cause of the poor methods of transportation and com- 
munication that were uncertain during that day, for 
since the advent of the steam-engine, telegraph, tele- 
phone, the automobile, and other means of rapid tran- 
sit, national lines of demarcation have been becoming 
less distinct. As nations communed with nations and 



138 APPENDIX 

understood each other better, they found less causes 
for differences and less need of watchmen on the walls. 

We cannot help but believe that with a better knowl- 
edge of each race by the other and on the part of each 
a better understanding of the great and common end 
of life, which is to serve and uplift, that racial strife 
and conflict will cease and ere long this old world wiU 
become the kingdom of our God. 

But these are not ancient times and things that were 
are not now. The cities of the plain are no longer 
separated, for the walls have been demolished and in- 
stead of the watchmen we have the teacher, the 
preacher and the politician to tell us the signs of the 
times. 

This is, pre-eminently, a progressive age ; an age of 
going forth; an age in which things move. With the 
new and varied inventions of the 19th and 20th Cen- 
turies, old customs and conditions are rapidly passing 
away and those nations, races, and individuals who 
cannot adjust themselves to these new conditions must 
be left behind. Just now grave and serious problems 
confront the American People and this, in itself, is a 
proof of our going forth. We must not deprecate 
them, we must not shirk them, they are ours, we must 
face them manfully, must shoulder them and stand up 
and walk. These problems are the mothers of pro- 
gress and instead of trying to turn from them or to 
dodge them, we should rejoice because we live at a 
time when we can help in the solution of such complex 
problems, whose results will have such far reaching 
and lasting effect upon the social and economic life of 
the American People. 



APPENDIX 139 

This country is one and inseparable and whatever is 
beneficial to the white man is beneficial to the black 
man also. The negro cannot hope at the present to 
play a very important part in the solution of great 
questions. At our best the part we must play can only 
be secondary. First, because our business operations 
have not brought us into intimate relation to these 
questions and we do not fully comprehend their mean- 
ing. Second, we can do but little because these ques- 
tions are political in their nature and must be settled 
by the ballot. The Negro in this section has been dis- 
franchised and therefore he cannot play at that game. 
Our being thus handicapped and prohibited from 
assisting in the solution of these great problems, is 
no reason why we should say there is nothing we can 
do. 

*'If you cannot cross the ocean 
And the heathen lands explore 

You can find the heathen nearer ; 

You can help them at your door. 

There are some problems, however, that are within 
our reach, upon the solution of which depends our 
future welfare in this country. They are, inefficiency, 
vagrancy, and crime. For a long time we have been 
hearing of the inefficiency of the Negro teacher, the 
inefficiency of the Negro preacher, but all the while it 
was said that he was a good worker ; that he was only 
fitted to do manual labor. The cry has gone out and 
is rapidly spreading to the effect that the Negro is 
worthless; that there is inefficiency in the pulpit, in- 
efficiency in the school-room, and now inefficiency on 



140 APPENDIX 

the farm. IneflSciency everywhere. Our race has lost 
many places of trust and honor because of this cry. 
I know personal cases where Negro men have been re- 
placed by white men because, they say, the black men 
were inefficient. This is as much true in New York as 
it is in Alabama. As the supply of efficient men in- 
creases, the demand for inefficient men will decrease 
and sooner or later there wdll be no room for the in- 
efficient man. He will be idle, cannot get any work to 
do. He will be added to the vagrant class. Already 
this class is too large among us; strong able-bodied 
men walking about with no home and nothing to do. 
This is a dangerous class. Of course, unless the vag- 
rant gets some work to do he will starve or have to 
leave the country; but this man does not do either. 
He becomes a parasite and lives of the honest toil of 
others. Sometimes he lives out of the white man^s 
kitchen, because his sweetheart is the cook ; sometimes 
because his old mother is a wash woman, and some- 
times because his sister is a nurse. This is the class, 
my white friends, that gives you trouble, this is the 
class that gives us trouble, this is the class that will 
give trouble to any community and we are as anxious 
as you are to rid ourselves of this body of death. 

Now the best class of Negroes and the best class of 
white people are agreed as to the fact that this dan- 
gerous class must be gotten rid of, but they differ as 
to methods. The Negro believes mostly in the pre- 
ventive method, the white man mostly in the cure 
method. The Negro says a good school in every com- 
munity will prevent, the white man says a good jail in 
every county will cure. The Negro says teach the 



APPENDIX 141 

law, the white man says enforce the law. The Negro 
cries for a state reformatory for the boys and girls 
of his race, the white man cries for the penitentiary 
for them. Now, this is not a very great difference 
after all and we should get together by each asking for 
the best schools to prevent these evils and then when 
the evils are committed, asking for the strictest law 
for their punishment. As for my part, it is not a 
question in my mind as to the cause of this increasing 
class among my people. It is plain to me that ignor- 
ance is the cause of ineflSciency, inefficiency the cause 
of vagrancy, and vagrancy the cause of crime. We 
must, therefore, seek the remedy in the removal of the 
cause. If ignorance be the mother of inefficiency, in- 
efficiency the mother of vagrancy, and vagrancy the 
mother of crime, it is plain that the removal of ignor- 
ance will stop the others. This can only be done by 
education and civic righteousness. 

I wish here to emphasize the fact that education is 
the source of all we have and the spring of all our 
future joys. Our religion, our morality, and that 
which is highest and best in our social and civic life, 
all come from education. Therefore, it is the primary 
factor in the elevation of all races. 

Our education should be of a threefold nature, viz. : 
Literary, Industrial and Religious. No limit should 
be placed upon the Negro's literary qualification. A 
race so largely segregated as ours, needs its own 
teachers, preachers, lawyers, doctors, pharmacists, and 
other professional and business men, and therefore 
they should be given the highest and best education 
that is obtainable. If our preachers and teachers are 



142 APPENDIX 

inefficient, it is because they are improperly educated. 
If the churches are growing cold and dying and the 
schools accomplishing but very little good, it is be- 
cause religion is not being made practical and educa- 
tion not being made to apply to our every day life. 
Such an end can only be accomplished through well 
and systematically trained teachers and preachers. 
Better teachers and better preachers will go a long 
way towards the alleviation of our ills. If we would 
secure the kind of education here referred to, we must 
be willing to pay for it ; we must make a sacrifice, we 
must care less about forms and fashions and more 
about the higher things of life. We must see less evils 
in the dollar and more good. 

We must not only have a good education, but we 
must have good industrial training. This is a scien- 
tific as well as a literary age. A scientific age is al- 
ways an age of inventions and with new inventions 
comes the demand for men qualified to manage large 
interests and complicated machinery. This demand 
can only be supplied by industrially trained men and 
women. This must be done in our industrial schools. 
Our hands should be as truly trained to work as our 
minds to think, and any education that teaches other- 
wise, is not worthy of the name. 

I know that in some sections my people are pre- 
judiced towards industrial schools, but this is foolish 
in the extreme. If we are to hold our own in this 
country, it must be by our ability to do work and to do 
it in the most acceptable manner. We are in a farm- 
ing section and I believe that we should therefore 
strive to be the best farmers in the world. Let us 



APPENDIX 143 

make a specialty of all the trades that are related in 
anyway to agriculture; endeavor to become the best 
stock raisers, the best truck gardeners, the best cooks, 
the best wash women, the best housekeepers, the best 
dress makers, the best blacksmiths, and in fact, the 
best in all that pertains to country life. 

Let us get hold of the lands we cultivate as far as 
possible and build better homes and keep our homes 
clean. But you say that we do not need industrial 
training. Let us see. Many years ago Henry Clay, 
in order to encourage home industry, introduced a bill 
in the Kentucky Legislature to the effect that the 
people of that state should use nothing save what 
could be produced in the state. Suppose today the 
white man of this country should say that the Negro 
must use only the things which he could make, what 
would be his condition! Could we cook with proper 
utensils I Could we eat with knives and forks ? Could 
we dress as we do now? Practically everything we 
wear or use was made by the white man and were he 
to institute such actions we would be helpless to pro- 
vide for ourselves. 

In our quest for knowledge, we must not overlook 
the education of the heart. Our religion should be 
made practical. It must be real and not visionary. 
No other will suffice. Our religion must consist more 
in deeds and less in words. 



SiAVE»-HowiA«>PRi; 

S71 Franklin St. 

'BOSTOM 



A 






4 <=>K 














c" * 










O * O « ' ,0 

y* av -Vv 















^. 











0' • ' ' 






















v^ ,^ 








'^ c^ ^ 




,v . 







-^^0^ 









o V _ 

,o V "^ .V 





bV" 











^'i.'- . o « o , -^ji^ ^^ .«■'*, ■^o <<&''' c o "» , '<*•> 








*^0^ 






A' 










H^x 



v .*':;'^ 




-v 








^Mr.'i 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




011 695 129 



I-: 



